Ocean of Deceit
by James Stapleton
Summary: Final update! Miami is known for its crimes, but the most horrible crime is committed: murder. With Frank captured as the prime suspect, will the detectives be able to show that he is innocent?
1. Prologue: Darkness

_**Foreword**_

Here is a brand new story. It involves the Hardy boys and Nancy Drew, but now, the Hardys will be in danger! If you think this story is just like those ND&HB Super Mystery, then you are WRONG! In ND&HB Super Mystery, Nancy is traveling with a friend and the Hardys are investigating a case, and they meet together by chance. But in this case, Frank and Joe will be the ones who are having fun, and Nancy will be investigating a murder! Also, this story has a prologue and an epilogue, so the prologue talks about how the story started and the epilogue talks about how the story ended. This story is much more detailed when compared to _Missing in Action_. The format is different too: there are two scenes shown in the beginning which are very important in solving the case. Please enjoy my latest story, _Ocean of Deceit_...

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_**1**_

**_Prologue: Darkness_**

The streets of Miami were silent during the night, which was very rare. Usually, people would roam about the dimly lit streets with no goal or plan. They just roamed there because they had nowhere else to go. It was not as though they wanted to. People with homes slept in their beds when people without were left outside in the humid weather. Moon was right over their heads, but it was not enough to light up their minds. It did not bring them the hope, the confidence, the future. Some committed suicide a long time ago because they could not bear to live their miserable life any more. They ended their life themselves, so they could go to places where they had no worry to be miserable about. While some committed suicide, others committed crimes. They stole from local food stores during the day and robbed others during the night. It was not the life they were planning to live, but it was the only choice they had. They had no special skills to earn themselves a job or two. They had no house to live in and spend the humid nights in. They had nowhere else to go, no one else to trust. Who were they? Why did they live the life they live now?

The bay was empty and dark. One ship was floating there, obviously trying to be concealed and unseen. The ship carried more than a few people. In fact, there were a few dozen of them aboard. Most of them had the look of hope on their faces. They felt the happiness that didn't occur to them in years, some decades. As they got off the boat, their feet touched the cold, wet sand and their eyes glittered with tears. They had made it. They had finally made it.

Most of the residents in the city of Miami were asleep After all, it was already close to two in the morning. The streetlamps illuminated the streets, but the darkness still overwhelmed the lights.

This person wasn't asleep.

The person had a hat and an overcoat that covered their entire body. The person could be a man or woman, young or old. With the hat and the overcoat, nobody could tell who the person was. Even though it was in the middle of July, the person wore the clothing fit for winter. With the temperature rising up to eighty degrees, it was the weather where you least expect a man to wear an overcoat.

With one hand, the mysterious person made sure his coat would not come off. If anybody saw him in the streets at that time, the entire plan would be ruined. Yes, the entire plan. He had been thinking about this for days, so if it were ruined, all the hard work would be wasted away. He had to act careful. He had to act calm. This was it. He had to do it.

This person looked around for a while, and then entered the building through a back door in the alley. The alley was dark, far darker than the streets. The moon was hidden behind the tall building, and the light from the streetlamps could not reach there. It was the world of completely darkness, or complete secrecy.

In the alley, garbage filled the dumpster right next to the door, giving off the foul odor that loomed over the entire area. Now, the only thing he saw was darkness. The only thing he smelt was the foul odor spreading through the air, but the man didn't seem to mind.

Man used the key he had and unlocked the old, heavy steel door. It opened with a loud creak, but the man didn't seem to hear it. He was thinking about something else, something more important, something he needed to think about.

The person closed the door as he entered the building, careful not to let it creak too much. When the door sealed shut, there was complete darkness again.

"Well, I see you've managed to come here," a voice said.

The person with the overcoat looked around, trying to find out who the voice belonged to and where the person was. In the utter darkness, trying to find the source of the voice was difficult. The voice then snickered.

"I can see you, but you can't see me. Isn't that unusual?"

Where was the voice coming from? The man looked around carefully. By the time his eyes adjusted to darkness, he saw the silhouette of the figure standing in the corner just twenty or so yards away from him.

The voice then said, "Did you bring the money?"

His hand in his pocket, the man in overcoat nodded sternly. As he took his hands out, the shadow saw an envelope. The envelope was golden yellow, the kind where you would find in the post office. He used his other hand to open the envelope and took out a small stack of bills.

"Is this it?"

He nodded.

"Good. Because if it isn't…"

The voice didn't complete the statement. The person knew what would happen if he didn't bring the money. He was afraid. He was very afraid.

The mysterious person took the envelope and took the money out. Slowly, the person began counting bill by bill. Each of the bills was a twenty-dollar one. With ten of them in the stack, the total sum added up to be two hundred dollars.

"Twenty…Forty…Sixty…Eighty…"

The person kept counting. It was as if he did not want to miss even one bill.

"A hundred…One hundred and twenty…One hundred and forty…One hundred and sixty…One hundred and eighty…"

Finally, the person in the shadows stopped. Even in the darkness, the man in overcoat could see that the person was grinning.

"Two hundred!"

With that, the person shoved the money into the pocket.

"Perfect," the voice said. "You brought exactly what I wanted. Now, do not tell this to anyone. You got that?"

The man in overcoat nodded.

"Humph! I hope so, since if you do tell anyone, then I will have to tell the authority what you did, and it's not going to be pretty. It's for your own sake."

The man again nodded.

"It's good that you understand. Now! Get out at once!"

The man got out in an instant, leaving the creaking door open and letting the odor outside come and fill the dark, empty space.

…

The kitchen filled with delicious aroma of Mrs. Hardy's homemade pancake.

"Frank! Joe! Fenton!" Mr. Hardy's sister, Miss Gertrude Hardy, yelled as she set the plates with pancakes onto the table. "Breakfast!"

As soon as she finished shouting the word, three figures dashed down the staircase and into the kitchen. Not only were they the three men in the family, but also were the ones who ate the most. They were Frank Hardy, Joe Hardy, and Fenton Hardy. Fenton was Frank and Joe's father.

"All right! Pancakes!" said the older of the two boys. He had the dark hair and a tall status. His good looks got him many girl admirers in the past, but he decided to stay with only one. His name was Frank, the older Hardy brother who therefore got more responsibility. He was more like a babysitter for his outgoing brother. "About time you changed the menu, Aunt Gertrude!"

"Oh, shush!" Gertrude Hardy said in a teasing way. She was a woman with a strong body and two spunky teenage boy detectives as her nephews. She was always bragging to her friends about how her name meant "spear strength" in Germanic when she was younger. Now, she was just another sports-loving woman who lived with her brother and his family. "I think the scrambled egg and roasted turkey was good enough for breakfast!"

"But for five days straight?" asked the blond-haired teenager. He was the younger of the two Hardy brothers and was always getting into trouble. With Frank always telling him how outgoing he was, he was sometimes annoyed with his older brother's treating him like a little kid. He always reminded him that he was also in high school. His name was Joe. "Come on, nobody would not hate having the same breakfast for so long."

Mr. Fenton Hardy, the two boys' father, laughed. He looked like Frank and Joe put together, only older. He picked up his glass of orange juice and drank from it. The private investigator was a police officer before, so he had experience in bringing the villains back to justice.

He was not the only one in the family who had been famous before, however. Frank and Joe were two detectives who handled many cases of their own from the one that took place in the mysterious tower to the most recent one involving the stolen vase and a sabotaged theater. The case mainly involved Nancy Drew, another famous eighteen-year-old detective from River Heights. She and Frank were having awkward relationship, since Nancy already had a boyfriend and Frank had a girl friend in their own town.

As the Hardys ate breakfast, the telephone in the hall rang. Frank went to answer it. "Hello?"

"Frank? This is Chet."

"Hi, Chet!" Frank said. Chet Morton was Frank and Joe's best friend, who was a little plump but was always trying to stay away from trouble, which the Hardys were anxious to find. "What's up?"

"Well, I won two tickets to wherever you want to go in United States. You see, I found this writing contest that seemed really interesting: I had to write a mystery story. Of course, I used the case you were working on just a few months ago. And guess what? I won! The third prize was two airplane tickets to anywhere in USA. I liked to go to the antique car exhibition with my dad, but he got sick and I had to go to my aunt's house to help her with the store."

"So you want us to go?"

"Yeah, you and Joe. You can choose wherever you want to go in United States. And I think you deserve the trip. All I did was talk about the mystery you two solved, so I think you two should have the ticket. Besides, you two seem to be working too much recently, with so many cases and all."

"But…" Frank was hesitant. "Are you sure about that?"

"Why not? You two are my best friends! Remember the time you saved my life from…"

"Okay, okay, I understand. Well, if you want us to have fun, then we will try to. I'll call you later about this."

"It's not necessary."

"Why?"

Suddenly, Chet hung up. A second later, the doorbell rang. Frank went to the front door and opened it. Chet was standing there with a big smile. "Surprise!"

Frank chuckled. He was calling from his cell phone and was standing in front of their house all along.

"I got the two tickets over here. Just call them today or tomorrow. Since it's summer vacation, I don't think you will be buried in school work anymore."

"When does the trip start?"

"Next week."

Frank took the tickets and smiled. "Thanks, pal."

Chet grinned, showing his white front teeth. "And I hope you don't bump into another case." With that, he went into his father's truck and drove away.

"Joe!" Frank shouted as he went into the kitchen. "Great news! We can finally plan a vacation without a case to work on."

The Hardys all looked at each other. "Well, that's a first," Joe said, surprised. "I really wish we won't bump into another mystery."

"Don't worry," Frank said in an assuring way. "I'm sure we won't."

And that was how the Hardys got into another mystery which they did not expect.


	2. Murder in Florida

**Foreword: Thank you for the five reviews. As I promised, I will update the story when I get five reviews. So here is the newest chapter. This one introduces Nancy and Ned. You'll see that the reason I made this story rated T is because of murder in the story. It's not very graphic, but I decided to make it rated T anyway. Enjoy, and please update!

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_**2**_

_**Murder in Florida**_

A blonde girl was waiting anxiously in front of her three-story house in the peaceful suburb of River Heights. Her height was about five-five and she had a pair of sparkling blue eyes that matched the color of her Ford mustang convertible she liked to drive. She wore light blue dress that matched the color of the sky and had a white purse that matched the color of the clouds. Her name was Nancy Drew. She was a detective. Ever since starting her career as a startling amateur detective at the age of sixteen two years ago, she had been working on numerous cases from kidnapping, fraud, and theft to murder, conspiracy, and false identity. She was now eighteen with a bright future in mind and a glorious day to look forward to.

Usually, Nancy did not wear something so glamorous and uncomfortable to move around in. Her feet were aching because of the shoes she wore with the heels and the dress was too long. She usually wore jeans and sneakers, sometimes shopping at the local mall with her two best friends Bess Marvin and George Fayne to find outfit she liked, and usually never wore skirts unless she was with her attorney father Carson Drew in a party or meeting a client. Usually, she never liked wearing something so flashy, but this was not one of the usual occasions. This was a date.

Like most of the girls her age, Nancy had a steady boyfriend. His name was Ned Nickerson, and their relationship had been going steady so far, even though they stopped seeing each other for a few months because of the campus life Ned had and the detective works Nancy had to work on. But after a while, they decided to get together again and talk for a little while.

So, the day of the date was today. Nancy had been waiting on her porch for more than ten minutes, wearing a white hat in order to block her face from the sun. It was a great morning with less clouds and more sunshine pouring down onto the ground. Ned was to arrive at nine but was not present at ten past nine. Nancy got a little worried and took out her cell phone. Dialing her boyfriend's cell phone number, she waited until she heard Ned's voice. "Hello?"

"What do you mean 'Hello'?" Nancy asked. "Do you know what time it is?"

"Sure. Ten minutes after the time I promised to meet you at your house. But the traffic was pretty bad, so I'm not driving as fast as I want to."

"Okay. I'll wait"—she looked at her watch—"for ten more minutes. If you still don't come, I'll go to the restaurant on my own car. Okay?"

"All right. I'll try to get there before that."

Nancy hung up and looked at the sky. It was already early July. The most recent mystery she solved was about her friend Bailey, who was being framed by an unknown person. But the case ended in such a tragic way Nancy did not want to remember. It seemed like just one of those bad nightmares, but it wasn't. It stayed in her head ever since she came back to River Heights from New York.

As she put her cell phone away, Nancy heard a car approaching. Looking up, she noticed that it was Ned. She smiled and waved, then got into the car.

"So where do you want to go first?" he asked.

"To eat breakfast," Nancy answered. "Hannah told me to eat something in the morning, but I didn't want to ruin my appetite. Besides, I wanted to enjoy the breakfast with you, of all persons."

Ned smiled. "Well, isn't that loyal?" Bending over, he kissed Nancy lightly on the cheek and turned the ignition back on. The car then dashed to the urban part of the town. Nancy lowered the window and enjoyed the warm breeze touch her face.

When Ned's car drove across the Muskoka River on the concrete bridge, Nancy saw the tall buildings that had up to twenty stories high. There were significantly few trees now and the tall buildings took up most of the space. The downtown was where Nancy's father worked and had his office.

"So which restaurant do you want to go to?" Ned asked, turning toward Nancy. "You live here. I'm just a visitor in River Heights. I barely know the way around."

Nancy thought for a moment. She then remembered the delicious breakfast she had in a restaurant her mother used to take her. Even though Nancy's mother died when she was only three, Nancy had a vivid memory of her in her mind, even though she couldn't quite remember her face. She heard from her father that Mrs. Drew used to take her to a restaurant that hired her college friend as a chef. He was very good chef, as Mr. Drew knew, and served delicious dishes and coffee to start your day. He once ate there and was delighted to find coffee with such magnificent aroma and refreshing aftertaste. When Nancy was ten, Mr. Drew brought her to that restaurant and ordered a breakfast meal for kids and she remember loving it and begging her father to bring her there the very next day. She remembered the excellent service and the friendly waiters and waitresses. She remembered the delicious orange jelly and the fruit smoothie.

Nodding, Nancy decided to tell it to Ned. "I know a perfect place: 'Seaside Oasis'. It's located at the corner of Rutherford Street and Baker Avenue."

Ned nodded. "But tell me how to go there," he added.

Nancy pointed out how to get to the restaurant as Ned drove the car. They got to the restaurant after five minutes. It was a fairly small restaurant that had the sign saying "Seashore Oasis: the Freshest Restaurant There Is." Nancy looked around for any parking space that was not taken. As she was searching for a space, a car got out of the parking space right across the street from the restaurant.

"There's one," she said, pointing to the available space. Ned nodded and drove the car skillfully into the small space. The young couple got out of the car and entered the small restaurant. Inside, the restaurant was almost full. Most of the people in there were enjoying a routine breakfast meal. Nancy and Ned were quickly being seated and were placed at the table right next to the window.

Ned looked at the menu and commented, "They are famous for their fruit desserts and fish cuisine." She flipped through the pages. "I heard that they get their ingredients straight from Florida."

Nancy ordered Fruit Shakers and Ham-Egg Traditional. Fruit Shakers was a smoothie that contained strawberries, oranges, and bananas. Even though it might seem strange, Nancy actually thought it tasted great with lemon in it. The Ham-Egg Traditional was just a plate with ham and egg on it, along with salad, bread, and butter. The salad contained lettuce, tomatoes, celery, and slices of apple. Poured on it was the restaurant's specialty sauce, which went well with the vegetables.

Ned ordered Fruit Shakers, which Nancy had recommended, and Burger Cuisine. Burger Cuisine was a hamburger with more vegetable than burger, with the ingredients in the salad Nancy ordered added in between the burger and the bun. Both dishes tasted great, but the smoothie was always Nancy's favorite. She liked how the smoothie was not too sweet and yet it was not too sour either.

As Nancy and Ned finished the breakfast, they saw a middle-aged man come out of the kitchen and smile at them. Nancy waved at the man and got out of her seat. Ned followed her with a questioning expression.

"Hello, Nancy!" the man said, looking at Nancy. "It's great to see you again."

"Same here, Mr. Chandler," Nancy said with a smile.

The man who Nancy called Mr. Chandler asked, "Why haven't you come here in more than a year?"

Nancy blushed, feeling embarrassed. "I've been very busy."

"I know." Mr. Chandler patted her back. "I've read about you in the newspapers. You've been solving quite a few mysteries all around the globe."

"Well, I didn't actually go after mysteries myself. They just come to me."

Mr. Chandler's smile faded. He looked around and noticed Ned. "Why is this lad?" he asked.

"Oh, he is my boyfriend Ned Nickerson," Nancy introduced. Then, turning to Ned, she said, "This is Mr. Kevin Chandler. He was my parents' friend from the time before I was born. He's the chef working in this restaurant."

Nancy then turned to Mr. Chandler. "Weren't you the one who went to Europe to get training? My dad said that you have studied cooking in England, France, Italy, and Spain."

Mr. Chandler chuckled. "Oh, I haven't been in Spain yet, but I have been in England, France, Italy, and Germany. They have the fine cuisine and I have been studying cooking for more than twenty years. Even now, I read recipe books written by famous chefs all around the world."

Then, his expression changed. "Anyway, Nancy and Ned, I would like to talk to you in private. Don't worry. My assistant chefs Gloria Lacombe and Peter Lanoka are very good cooks themselves, and they will be cooking for the guests when I'm gone for a short while. Please, come into my office."

Nancy and Ned stepped into the finely decorated office. There was a window facing the alley, and paintings were hung on the walls. Mr. Chandler went to his office. His expression was serious.

"Nancy, I would like you to investigate a murder case for me."

"A what?" Nancy almost shouted it out, but she managed to keep her voice down. "But…why ask me?"

Mr. Chandler looked out of his window. "Last week, my sister, Christina Stuart, was found dead on a beach just a few miles away from the orange farm from where our oranges were delivered. She fell from the cliff. Christina owned a company that sold oranges, and she sent me oranges every week. She was a great business partner, since I didn't trust the quality of the oranges sold anywhere else. Her orange was much better than the other ones. Using her oranges was one of the reasons my business has been booming."

The gray-haired man paused to take a breath. He was trying to control his voice. "But… she was dead. Police say that she must have fallen from the cliff that was thirty feet tall and broke her neck. When I heard the news from her husband, I was so shocked…" He stopped, a drop of tear rolling down his cheek. "I was also mad. They later found that there were two sets of footprints leading to the cliff. This showed that she must have been pushed from the top of the cliff!"

Nancy gasped. "How could someone do such cruel thing?"

Ned thought for a moment. "So you want Nancy to investigate because you don't trust the police?"

Mr. Chandler nodded. "Yes. The police say they have been doing the best they could, but I doubt that, since there is not a single lead." He looked at Nancy. "Can you take the case? I know it could be dangerous, but I desperately need to find out who killed my sister. Will you do it for me?"

Nancy thought for a moment. She didn't want to get into another mystery yet, but she couldn't let the murderer get away with such a horrid crime. After ten seconds, she nodded. "I will take this case, Mr. Chandler. Could you tell me where to go?"

The middle-aged chef seemed relieved. "I can never thank you enough, Nancy. I will send the plane fare and the address of my sister's home address to you in a few days. I know this might be dangerous, but I can't trust anyone else, not even the police or a private investigator. I trust you because you are the daughter of my best friend, Nancy."

Ned grinned. "If Nancy's going, then I will, too. She has solved many cases, and none of them ended up without a dangerous situation in the end. I'll be Nancy's boyfriend and her personal body guard."

"That's really sweet, Ned," Nancy said, blushing. "I will ask my dad and get permission from him to go to Florida for a 'vacation', since if he knew I was investigating a murder, he would do anything to stop me, even tie me down to the sofa! And could you keep this a secret, Mr. Chandler?"

Mr. Chandler nodded. "Once more, I can't ever thank you enough, Nancy. I appreciate it very much."

Nancy and Ned went out of the restaurant and out into the busy street. As Ned got the car out of the parking space, Nancy looked out the window and saw the sunny sky.

I will enjoy today as much as possible, she thought. After all, our date is not finished yet!

The young couple then went to the movie theater to watch the movie Nancy was itching to see and ate lunch at the nearby café.

The name of the café was "Riverside Coffee", but it didn't just sell coffee. It sold delicious turkey sandwich and cold milkshake. Those two were the ones Nancy ordered. Ned ordered the milkshake with hot dog.

"Oh, I need to go to wash my hands," Nancy said to Ned, rushing into the restroom.

Nobody was in the restroom and Nancy washed her hands in one of the three sinks. The door opened, but she didn't hear the sound. She was about to dry her hands with the paper towel when a hand grabbed her shoulder.

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**Postscript: One reader who is a Ned Nickerson fan wanted me to put Ned in, so I decided to take her advice. Actually, she's the biggest Ned fan I've ever seen! And thanks for telling me about my mistakes. I fixed the Mr. Frank part and some other parts. I'll update as soon as I either get five reviews or finish the chapter, depending on my mood:-) Anyway, thanks for reading this chapter and I hope you will review the next one as well.  
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	3. Together Once Again

_**Foreword: **_**I should stop making such dumb mistakes. Better proofread multiple times before submitting... Thanks for telling me, as usual... Please review, by the way...  
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_**3**_

_**Together Once Again**_

Instantly, fear rushed into Nancy's mind and she turned around abruptly, putting her arms up to defend herself. But what she saw behind her was not a hunky man planning to attack her; after all it was the lady's room. What she saw was a dark-haired girl with twinkling eyes and a tall stature. Also being an eighteen-year-old girl, she was taller than Nancy and had the height of five-eight. She was slender, yet very athletic, and she carried a duffle bag that had "Sports 4 Life" printed on it. When Nancy saw that, she immediately knew whom the girl was.

"What a surprise!" she said with a smile. "I didn't know I could meet you here, George."

The girl smiled back. She was called George Fayne from her friends, even though everyone knew that was a masculine name. With her athletic body and her short brown hair, she was certainly a tomboy, as anybody would assume from first seeing her. Even though she was a tomboy, she did have some feminine side; she liked to shop with her friends and talked on the phone for a long time. Ever since getting her first cell phone when she was fifteen, she had been using it practically everyday. She always told her parents that it was important to keep up-to-date on the world and that she needed it to practice her communication skills when they were upset when they got their monthly phone bill. Ever since the time she had used up her battery when she talked for two hours on the phone, she had been careful not to let that happen again and turned the power off every time she had finished talking with her friends.

"I didn't know _you _would be here," George said. "And I saw that cute brown-haired guy out there waiting for his date to come out of the washroom. So, are you and Ned having a good time?"

Nancy nodded cheerily. "Of course! It's been super."

George observed Nancy's face for a moment, and an even bigger grin spread over her face. "Let me guess. A new case?"

The girl detective nodded once again. She knew she couldn't hide anything from her best friend, who she had met in preschool when they were in the same class. The two girls, along with Bess Marvin, were best friends for more than ten years, and they no each other better than anyone else. George could always tell if Nancy was on a case or not simply by looking at her face.

"But let's go outside and talk about it, okay? I don't want to make Ned wait too long," Nancy added.

As George and Nancy got out of the bathroom, Ned looked up in surprise. He obviously did not notice George's entering the restroom. "Hi, George," Ned called, folding the menu in half. "How were you?"

George grinned. "I'm excited because Nancy here has gotten herself another mystery!" She then turned to Nancy as the two girls sat down. "So will you tell me about this new case now?"

Nancy took a sip from the glass of water the waitress had put on the table and started, "Well, this isn't like my usual case, George. It's a murder investigation."

"A what?" George was truly surprised to hear that. "But… who? Why? Where? When?"

"A murder, my parents' friend Mr. Chandler, because he didn't think the police were trying hard enough, in Florida, next week," Nancy answered, taking another sip, and grinned. "You forgot 'how'."

George shook her head. "You shouldn't be investigating a murder, Nancy Drew, even though you are the best detective I've ever met."

"Since when did you start acting like my dad?" Nancy said with an unbelieving look in her eyes. "Come on, it's in Florida! We can call Bess and go there together! It'll be a blast! And this time of the year is the best season to go swimming and get a tan and…"

"She's not coming," George interrupted.

"Why?" Nancy asked.

"Because she had to go to New Mexico."

"Huh?" Ned interrupted. "Bess? New Mexico? Why—"

"Let me guess," said Nancy. "She wanted a tan and conveniently found a boyfriend who offered her a trip to New Mexico?"

"Mmm…" George was thinking. "You are half right. She did go there because she wanted a tan. But she didn't get a trip to New Mexico from a new boyfriend, even though it seems really likely."

The reason George said that was because Bess had been flirting with every single man she could meet ever since Dave Evans left her because he flew to England in order to study biology there. She had been extremely sad for a few days until she met a handsome young man when traveling in a case with Nancy. But her new relationship did not last long, either. Because of this, she had been dating numerous men for a short time and kept looking for the one she felt passionate to.

"Then… how did she get the money to go to New Mexico? I don't think she can afford this ever since her allowance has been cut."

Bess was very interested in computer and programming, since she was not as athletic as her cousin and didn't feel like playing many sports. Nancy remembered the time when Bess was trying to fix a problem on her computer and ended up destroying all the data, including the ones Mr. Marvin needed for his job. Mr. and Mrs. Marvin got very angry, obviously, and cut her allowance in half, thinking that it would make her think of what she did. This was a month ago, and Bess complained numerously to Nancy that her allowance was not enough to even go out to get some popcorn and movie tickets every Friday.

"You see, she was really into writing," George said. Nancy knew of that, since Bess had been joining the writing clubs when they were still in high school. She even boasted that she wrote one full-length romance novel starring (you guessed it!) a beautiful girl named Elizabeth Marvin and a handsome boyfriend David Evans. Of course, George found it to be too "touchy" and makes her "sick to the stomach." Nancy thought it was okay, even though what she really liked to read was some action-filled mystery.

"Yeah, so?" Ned wanted to know.

"So she entered this mystery writing contest. She gave it the title: _Missing in Action_. And it was based on the most recent mystery we were working on. She wrote it and submitted it. Sure enough, her novel got one of the two first prizes. And the prize was two tickets to anywhere you wanted to go in United States."

"Who won the other first prize?" Nancy asked curiously.

"A guy named Chet Morton," George said, taking the cup of cold water and putting the ice into her mouth. "Oooh, that's cold!"

Nancy's eyes got larger. "Chet Morton?" She knew that name! She heard the name from Frank and Joe Hardy. Chet was their friend, and he won the first prize as well?

"But what happened to the other ticket?" Ned asked.

"She went to New Mexico with her cousin."

"Cousin? But you are still here!" Ned exclaimed with surprise.

George rolled her eyes. "Hey, I'm not her _only _cousin, you know. Nancy, do you remember Carol Wipple, I mean, Carol Boonton?"

Nancy nodded. Carol was involved with one of the cases she solved. She called it _The Sign of the Twisted Candles._ She was between the family feuds concerning Asa Sidney's estate. "How can I forget? And I guess she was glad to go with her?"

George nodded. "Well, she knew that Carol had never traveled out of state in her life." She was working in the secluded inn called The Sign of the Twisted Candles and went living in the boarding school. But in the summers went to live with the Marvins and during the winters the Faynes. So she had been with Bess during the entire summer vacation and with George during the Christmas break. "And Bess suggested that she do so. Carol was nearly crying with joy when she heard the news. So I just let those two go to New Mexico. But…" She turned to Nancy. "…I see that my other best friend got a mystery on her hands, so I think I should stick with her as her second body guard!"

Ned chuckled and so did Nancy. She knew that George learned karate and had brown belt. Nancy also learned karate but couldn't compete with George, who was far better, taller, and stronger.

"Then that's settled," Ned said. "I'll ask my folks if I can come with you, Nance."

"And so will I," said George, standing up. "But first, I must go get the dry cleaning to pick up my mom's dresses. See ya!"

Leaving two one-dollar bills for the snack she ordered on the table, George went out the restaurant door and disappeared out of sight.

* * *

Frank and Joe Hardy looked at the tickets they had. "Let's see…" Frank murmured, reading the terminal number. "The plane will take off in less than an hour." 

"Well, have fun, you two. You deserve it," Callie Shaw, Frank's girlfriend, said, waving her hand with a smile on her face.

"Yeah, Joe. Don't make a new girlfriend there," Iola Morton, Chet's younger sister and Joe's girlfriend, said teasingly. "I know how your looks can attract a thousand women."

"See you two later! Have fun and hope you won't have to solve another mystery!" Chet said. They were all behind the security area watching as the Hardys went through the security check and getting their bags and suitcases.

Frank and Joe waved back. Frank had an uneasy feeling in his mind. Was he just worrying too much or did he feel he was going to face more danger in Miami?"

"By the way, Joe," Frank started as they saw that their friends were out of sight, "why did you choose Miami?"

Joe rolled his eyes. "It's the city with a lot of sunlight. I'd like to swim in the gulf, not just in Atlantic Ocean."

Frank looked at the brochure he was holding. "Joe, Miami Beach is between the Atlantic Ocean and the Biscayne Bay, not the Golf of Mexico. You might want to study more geography."

Joe looked at his older brother with the what-a-know-it-all-he-is look.

Frank ignored it. "I hear that they have the most delicious oranges sold in this particular farm," he said. "It's pretty famous."

"We didn't come here to eat oranges, Frank," Joe said pointedly. "Boy, do you know how to have fun," he added sarcastically.

The Hardys went to the terminal and looked at the clock. It was still eight-thirty. The plane wouldn't arrive for thirty more minutes. Frank stood up and looked at the message board. It said: "Miami International Airport 9:00 A.M."

Suddenly, a thought came to Frank's head. _Miami International Airport… MIA… Missing in Action!_

Frank suddenly remembered. _Yeah! Chet was talking about this. He said that the second first-prize winner wrote a story named _Missing in Action_! And he said that the story was just like the one we told him. He said that the main plot was just like the most recent mystery Nancy, Joe, and I solved. But could she be here?_

_No,_ Frank thought, shaking his head. _That's not possible. Chet said that the name of the author was definitely not Nancy Drew, even though he can't remember who it was. But… what if she _was _here? I haven't heard from her in months. But what if…?_

Joe looked at his eighteen-year-old brother. "Hey, Frank. What's on your mind?"

Frank looked up abruptly. "No, nothing… I was just—"

Frank's sentence was interrupted by the announcement made by one of the ladies at the podium. "Ladies and gentlemen. Flight 642 has arrived. If you sit in the section one or two of the plane, please come up."

"That's us," Frank said, standing up. He grabbed his suitcase and his bag and went to the man at the machine. He gave him his ticket and the man put it into the machine. In less than a second, the ticket came out from the other end of the machine and the man took it out, then handing it to the dark-haired detective. He and Joe went into the plane. Their seats weren't at the first class or business class. Joe got the window seat while his older brother got the one in the middle. After putting their suitcases and bags on the compartment above their seats, Frank and Joe sat down and took out the magazine.

In less than five minutes, a girl came to the seat next to the Hardys and stopped. She grabbed her suitcase and bags, but it was heavier than she thought. Frank noticed this and put his magazine down and looked up. "Would you like me to—?"

Both of them stopped. The girl's eyes got larger and Frank's mouth was open with shock. The girl had the familiar titian-colored hair and the eyes as blue as the Atlantic Ocean. In an instant, Frank felt happy, shocked, and confused at the same time.

"Nancy Drew! Why are you here?"


	4. Invitation to Crime

_**Foreword:**_** One of the most exciting updates is finally made! I decided to go third-person after all, since I didn't want to confuse my readers. Anyway, this is when the murder occurs, and the prime suspect is someone the detectives don't want to believe. It took me a long time to write this chapter, since I wanted to put a lot of things in just one chapter. I wish you will enjoy and review it. The more reviews I get, the faster I will update (well, probably) ! So here is the newest chapter: Invitation to Crime...

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_**4**_

_**Invitation to Crime**_

Nancy did not expect to see the two detectives. After all, she was thinking of a flight with Ned and George. But the Hardys' appearance made her gasp. Frank was sitting down next to the seat that was assigned to her, even though Ned and George, somehow, were seated far at the back. They both got permissions to go to the trip with Nancy, just telling to their parents that they were planning to spend some time under the sun. The fare was paid by their parents, even though Ned and George paid half from their own allowances.

"Wow! What a surprise!" Nancy managed to say. "I didn't know you two were on a case in Florida as well."

* * *

_Nancy got the letter from Mr. Chandler just five days before, telling her the place she would be staying and the address of the plantation. She found out from the letter that the place she and her friends would be staying at was owned by the husband of Mr. Chandler's sister. He said that his name was Mr. Percival Stuart, a prominent attorney._

_"What? That doesn't make sense!" George had said. "If he was an attorney, then why does he have an orange farm?"_

_Nancy read the sentences after the part where she stopped and nodded. "I understand now. The orange farm is his wife's business, and she hired some other people to help her do the job at the plantation. It says here that Mr. Stuart was mainly working in his office and home on his cases, but he sometimes went out of the city. Since he couldn't help his wife as much because of his business, he decided that the best thing to do was hire his relatives, who were glad to help his brother."_

_Apparently, the people staying in the house were his older brother, Jerome Stuart; his younger brother, Kent Stuart; his sister, Patricia Morley; and her husband, Chris Morley. The place they were staying in was the bed-and-breakfast owned by the Stuarts._

_"Geez," George had muttered. "Mr. Stuart is an attorney, Mrs. Stuart maintains the orange farm business, and they own a building and makes it a bed-and-breakfast? Boy, they must have tons of income from those businesses."_

_Nancy nodded. "They hire a lot of people to maintain those two businesses. It says that he booked two rooms for us. Mr. Chandler wrote that Jerome, Kent, Patricia, and Chris live nearby, about an hour's drive to the inn. The inn's name is, obviously, Orange Farm Inn. He says he wants this case to be a private investigation because there will be other guests who will be staying at the inn."_

_George still had more questions. "So there isn't any suspect?" she had asked._

_Nancy shook her head. "None so far."_

* * *

"So are you going to Florida for vacation or a case?" Frank asked.

Nancy answered, "Oh, Ned, George and I are there going for vacation. We thought we needed some time off from work and mysteries."

Frank nodded understandingly. "Same here. Joe and I are planning to do the same here. I was thinking about visiting this cool orange farm that is nationally known for the oranges they sold. Joe and I'll be staying at the inn owned by the farm's owner."

Joe then spoke: "Yeah. Mrs. Morley was Aunt Gertrude's friend since high school and she works at the farm, so she invited us to a week at the farm. She said she could use some help at the farm."

Small world, Nancy thought wryly. But she said, "Oh, really? We are staying there as well!"

Frank was amazed. "Wow. What a coincidence!"

Before they could say more, the stewardess started talking, "Please secure your seatbelts and turn off all electronic appliances."

Nancy and the Hardys did what she said and before long the plane was taking off.

In two hours, the two teams were at the Miami International Airport. As they went to the exit, Nancy told Ned and George about the Hardys. They were surprised at the fact that they were going to stay at the same inn Ned, George, and Nancy had booked.

As the five teenagers took their luggage from the carousel, they were met by a middle-aged couple. Nancy immediately knew that they were the Morleys. Mrs. Morley was a short, chubby woman who made Nancy think of Hannah Gruen, her housekeeper who was staying in the Drews residence with Nancy and her father ever since Mrs. Drew died because of an illness.

Mr. Morley was a tall man who seemed to be about four years younger than his wife. He had thick gray eyebrows and a black mustache that made him look like a sophisticated Englishman. His head was gray but not actually bolding yet, just like Nancy's father. Some black strands of hair showed beneath his gray ones that covered his entire head.

Mrs. Morley smiled warmly and introduced themselves. Mr. Morley, who was obviously not a people-person, remained unsmiling and stern, as if he treated his life as a serious business meeting. One thing was sure to Nancy: she didn't want to tell a joke to him, since she knew he wouldn't laugh.

"Please follow us to the van parked outside. We will be driving about one and a half hours to Florida Key and we'll be walking for a couple of miles to the farm," said the lady.

"A…A couple of _miles_?" George asked disbelievingly. "Why?"

"There won't be a road broad enough for us to drive the car on. Besides, it's good for your body when you walk."

"Ugh," Frank heard Joe groan. "I knew I shouldn't have brought so many things here if we knew we would be walking for a couple of miles. I brought my laptop and all those detective gadgets just in case."

Frank shook his head. "Little brother, this is a vacation we haven't taken in a long time. Why worry about a new mystery popping up?"

Nancy suppressed a grin. She hoped she didn't need help from those two because they were on vacation, unlike her.

Ned was watching the two talk without saying a word. He just carried his suitcases, still keeping his eyes on Frank and Nancy.

After a few miles of walking, the team arrived at the inn, which was concealed by numerous trees and bushes. Beyond the two-story inn, there were innumerable orange orchards and trees. Beyond those, Nancy saw the Atlantic Ocean and the beach.

"This is really beautiful," George said, walking toward the bed-and-breakfast.

"It sure is," Mrs. Morley said with a smile. "Please come in."

As the young visitors entered, Nancy was surprised to see the well-decorated interior and many paintings hanging on the wall. There was a reception desk in the middle of the lobby.

After getting the keys, the teenagers decided to look for their rooms. Nancy noticed that all three of their rooms were upstairs. There was a staircase right next to the reception desk. As they climbed up the stairs, Nancy looked at her key card. She and George were going to share room nine which was right next to the stairs. Next to it was room eight, where Ned was staying. Nancy saw a wall beyond the door of Ned's room. Turning right, she noticed room seven, where Joe was staying. And again, the corridor turned right and led to room six. The next right-turn led to room five, where Frank was staying. Going beyond that would lead to the staircase the group used to get upstairs.

Nancy and George went inside room nine using the key Nancy had. Inside they were amazed at the clean wallpaper and antique furniture, with two queen-size beds touching the wall facing south. Each of the rooms had their own bathroom and sink. Between the beds was a large window with curtains covering it. Sunlight poured into the room as Nancy opened the window. Nancy noticed that the room was decorated and maintained better than most of the hotel rooms she had stayed in before.

"This is definitely the best hotel I've ever stayed in," George said, as if she knew what Nancy was thinking.

After putting away their luggage in their rooms, the visitors went down to the first floor to meet the other people staying at the inn. Mrs. Morley was at the reception desk and was writing something on a piece of paper. As she noticed the visitors coming down, she hurriedly shoved it into the desk drawer and smiled welcomingly. "Did you make yourselves at home?" she asked.

Nancy nodded. "Who else is staying here right now?"

"Well, there are my brothers Jimmy, Percy, and Kent. I call Jerome and Percival that. They seem to hate my calling them Jimmy and Percy, but I don't care, since I'm the older sister," she said, grinning. "I'm sure you treat your brother that way, Frank."

Frank smiled and looked at Joe, "I don't call you names, do I, Joseph?"

Joe made a face. "Whatever."

"So there's no other guest?" Nancy asked.

Mrs. Morley thought for a second and nodded. "There is one more person. Sam Cantu is his name… He's my cousin and is the CEO of his company. He came here because he wanted to enjoy the sun, even though I doubt it."

"Why do you think so?"

"Because he was never a people-person, just like my husband," she said in a whisper so Mr. Morley couldn't hear. George suppressed a giggle. "Anyway, he hates mosquitoes and hot weather, since he had the awful experience with mosquitoes at the Everglades National Park when we went there thirty-some years ago. He went wandering off into the swamps and got so many mosquito bites you would hardly tell it was he!" She then laughed for a while. "Anyway, he is the CEO of his company, which doesn't seem to go well these days. I heard he was on a verge of bankruptcy!"

George gasped. "Really? Then why would he come here?"

Mrs. Morley shrugged. "I honestly have no idea. Anyway, you two." She faced Frank and Joe. "I'm really glad you could come here and help out the farm. We have been on edge ever since Christina died in an accident."

"Who died?" Frank asked in surprise.

"Christina Stuart. She is—I mean, _was_—Percival's wife who started this orange business that has been going pretty well. I can say it was all thanks to her."

As she finished the sentence, a gray-haired man came into the inn and walked to the room right behind the reception desk without saying a word to the group gathered in the middle of the lobby. As he closed the door, Mrs. Morley made a face. "That was Sam. You might want to call him 'Mr. Cantu.' You see, he has an ego bigger than the size of Florida! And with his attitude, I don't think he wants anybody around him. And the room over there—that's room four, by the way—is the one he's staying in. Room one, which is right over there," she said, pointing to the one facing Mr. Cantu's room, "is where Chris and I will be staying. The one next to us is Jerry's room, and the one just before the dining hall is Kent's. You might want to talk to my other siblings: they are really friendly, unlike my cousin in that room."

Then, a man who looked just like Mrs. Morley but was about ten years younger came out of room six. Nancy remembered that it was the room where Mr. Percival Stuart had stayed. Mr. Stuart smiled as he noticed the young visitors. "Hello, my name is Percival. I welcome you to my inn."

"It's a very nice one, Mr. Stuart," Nancy said.

"Oh, please, call me Percival. I'm sure with three Stuarts in this house, you will get yourself confused calling all of us 'Mr. Stuart'!"

Frank was sure about the friendly part about Mrs. Morley's speech. This man seemed really glad they were here. But, why?

Percival looked at Nancy, George and Ned. "And you three are the ones Kevin sent, am I correct?"

Nancy, George, and Ned all nodded. Percival smiled. "I'm very glad you could come. Please make yourselves at home."

Percival then excused himself and went outside. Mrs. Morley then went into the kitchen and the teenagers decided to enjoy Florida for the rest of the afternoon. Frank, Joe, and Ned wanted to go to the Everglades National Park while Nancy and George voted for the Barracuda Golf Course, which was just about ten minutes drive from the farm. Obviously, the Everglades won and the team decided to rent a car and go there. After a few hours at the national park, they came back, all sweaty and tired from the adventure they had.

When they came back to the inn, they noticed that it was already five o'clock. Nancy and George decided to go take a shower while the Hardys went to their rooms and get some rest before dinner. Ned went back into his room to work on a project he had to do during the summer vacation.

Frank closed the door of his room and sat down onto the bed. "Wow, I never thought Nancy would be here in Florida. What a coincidence! I just hope there won't be a mystery this time. I'm getting wary of those…"

As he thought about the most recent mystery he, Joe, and Nancy solved together, someone came to the door and slid something into the room through the small opening between the door and the floor. Frank noticed it and opened the door immediately, but nobody was there. He saw that the person had slid into his room an envelope. He opened it and took out the piece of paper inside. He read it. "Huh?"

* * *

Joe was taking a nap when the phone suddenly rang. It made him wide away and a little short-tempered because of his nap being interfered. He answered it. "Hello?"

"Dining hall…" a voice said in a whisper. "Come to the dining room…"

"Wha?" Joe was confused. "Who are you?"

"Come to the dining room…" the voice repeated. "Now…"

"Who are you?"

Click!

The caller hung up. Joe didn't waste any time. This might be a frantic call for help. He needed to go to the dining hall and see if anyone was injured.

_But…_ he thought. _But would he call me? Why didn't he call 911?_

Joe didn't stop and think about it either. He ran across the hall and down the stairs. He noticed that Nancy and George was at the lounge reading magazines. They looked up from those magazines and stared at Joe with questioning looks.

"What's the hurry, Joe?" George asked.

"I got the call telling me to go to the dining room. I'm not sure who the person was, but I'm going there to—"

_Smash!_

The detectives froze as they heard the noise of glass shattering. It was coming from the dining room! They quickly dashed to the closed door and opened it forcefully.

And they were shocked to see what was inside the dining room. There was a person lying down with his head in the pool of dark-red liquid.

It was blood.

George covered her mouth as she saw the blood. It was a body, the body of Sam Cantu. He was sprawled on the floor, face down, with his right hand reaching out in front of him. He was not moving. And someone was sitting on the chair, his dark eyes wide open in shock and horror. His hand clenched on the golden statue with blood on it, and on the floor were a shattered vase and the flowers in it. Nancy, George, and Joe just stared at the person sitting on the chair, not believing what they saw.

The person was Frank Hardy.

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_**Postscript**_**_: Wasn't that the most shocking chapter of the entire story so far? _I will be updating this story as soon as I get five reviews, but it might take me a few days longer. Anyway, if you have any question, please e-mail me. I'm showing my e-mail address in my profile. Don't forget to review!  
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	5. The One and Only Suspect

_**Foreword: **_**I think it's about time to update this story. Frank was found in a room with a dead man, but now, the detectives will face another obstacle: the room was completely locked and was impossible for a person to get out after framing Frank! As I promised, this is not going to be like the usual ND&HB Sup Mys because it's more like a true mystery novel and has less romance. Please review!

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_**5**_

_**The One and Only Suspect**_

The first one to move was Nancy. She went to the limp body and checked the pulse. After a few moments later, she bit her lower lip and looked up, shaking her head.

"Sam is dead."

"What was that noise about?"

Nancy turned around. It was Mrs. Morley. Behind her was Mr. Morley. Then, three more people came to the lobby. There were Ned, Jerome, Percival, and Kent. They all had worried looks on their faces after hearing the sound of shattering glass.

Mrs. Morley was the one who screamed as she saw the body of her cousin on the floor. He was not moving, and an eighteen-year-old dark-haired boy was sitting on the chair, holding a golden statue with blood splattered on it. In an instant, she deduced what had happened and screamed once again.

"What have you done, Frank?" she asked. It was more like crying.

"I… I didn't do anything," Frank said, trying to stand up. "Oh, my head…"

He brought his left hand to his face and gasped. There was blood on his left hand, and he had no idea how it got there. After all, he didn't feel hurt anywhere except the back of his head, and he knew he wasn't hurt that bad. But when he looked at the lifeless body of a man in front of him, he knew instantly where the blood came from. The room filled with the sick odor of fresh blood.

"I'll call 9-1-1!" one of Percival's two brothers said. He had blond hair and brown eyes. Looking at his age, Nancy deduced that he was Kent Stuart, the youngest in the whole family. He took out his cell phone and dialed 9-1-1. He then went to the lounge and talked to the operator.

"This is not happening…" the other brother said. He had gray hair and looked older than Percival but younger than Mrs. Morley. He must be Jerome. He also had brown eyes. As Nancy looked, the entire family had brown eyes.

"Frank, why are you here?" Joe finally asked.

"I was told to come here."

"What?" George asked. "Who?"

"I don't know." Frank held the back of his head. "Oh, my head is pounding."

"You can tell us what happened later," Nancy said. "But now, we need the police to come." She then turned to the others. "Please do not touch anything in the inn before the police comes here. We need to preserve the crime scene as it is. They need to dust the area for fingerprints."

"Why do they have to do that?"

It was Mr. Morley. He had a cold stare, and he was staring at Frank. "We already know who the murderer is."

Mrs. Morley covered her face. The three Stuarts looked nervously around, but from their looks, Nancy knew that they were convinced Frank was the killer. Nancy immediately had an idea.

"Sam must have knocked down the vase when he collapsed, so the killer must have been still in the room when he collapsed. George and I were in the lounge reading magazines when Joe and we heard the crashing sound. And no one has escaped through this door," she said, facing the door where the others were standing at, "so the killer must have escaped from the other door in this room." She walked to the door that was at the wall facing north. Taking out her gloves, Nancy tried the knob.

"What?"

It was locked. She turned to the others. "Does anyone have key to this room?"

"There is no key," Mrs. Morley said. "This room can be locked only from the inside. Besides, we didn't have to worry about being locked out because you can never lock this door without someone in this room to lock it in the first place."

"Then, this must mean a locked room!" Percival Stuart, who was a famous attorney, said. "And only one person could have committed the crime."

"No!" George shouted. "Frank would never kill anyone. He's the son of Fenton Hardy, a famous private investigator!"

For a second, the guests were silent as they heard that the dark-haired eighteen-year-old was the famous detective's son.

"But it doesn't matter," Mr. Morley said. "This is a murder case. I don't care who your father is. You can commit a murder even when your father is the king of the world!"

After that, nobody said anything.

A few minutes later, the police finally arrived. There were some crews from the rescue team who came here on foot. One of them was sure that Sam was dead.

"He must have been hit multiple times by someone who used a hard object with a circular base," he said. "And I'm sure we found our murderer here."

Joe was maddened by that remark. "My brother would never commit a murder. Besides, we never even talked to Sam Cantu. He has no motive."

Nancy added, "Besides, we just came here today. We haven't even talked to any other person here in Florida."

A police officer came into the room. "Mr. Hardy," he said, facing Frank who was standing in the middle of the lobby, "you are hereby arrested for the murder of Samuel Cantu." He snapped the handcuff on Frank's wrists. "Come with us to the station." And then he turned to Nancy, George, Ned, and Joe. "And you four. Come with us to the station as well; we'll need to hear from you about the condition you found the body in."

They didn't argue. They followed the officers into three separate police cars. Few minutes later they arrived at the police station. The interrogation seemed to last forever, but the four teenagers were finally released. Frank was sitting at a desk in a separate room when they went to see him.

"Frank," Nancy said, "you _must_ tell us what happened. Why did you end up in that room with the body?"

Frank looked up. He seemed to be confused. "I got this letter telling me to come to the dining room right away. Someone had come to the door and slipped it into the room. I don't know who it was, but I went to the dining room anyway. But when I opened the door, nobody was inside. I then heard someone coming, so I turned around. That's when I felt something hard hit the back of my head. I heard the glass vase shattering and opened my eyes. My head was throbbing and I didn't know what was going on until I saw the body in front of me in the pool of blood."

"So someone must have framed Frank," Joe said, "but I don't know who."

"A murderer is still out there," Nancy added, "and I won't rest until I find who he is. And I have a hunch that the two murders are connected—"

"What?" Joe asked, surprised. "What do you mean two murders?"

Nancy immediately knew that her mouth had slipped. She wasn't supposed to tell the Hardys about the murder case she was asked to investigate, but now she knew she had to tell them what she was hiding all along.

"Okay, Ned, George, and I came here to Florida because we were asked to investigate a murder case. A friend of my parents' wanted me to catch the person responsible for killing Christina Stuart. And I think the two murders may be linked. After all, they both took place at the farm."

Just then, the officer came into the room. "I'm afraid you'll have to leave. We will be analyzing the blood found on the golden statue Mr. Hardy was holding. We have his fingerprints, and if we find that the blood on the statue matches Mr. Cantu's blood, then that will be all the evidence we need to convict him of a murder."

Nancy was horrified. "But he has no motive!"

"Maybe he and the victim got into a fight, or maybe he was having a grudge on the victim. Who knows? Unless proven otherwise, I am going to charge him of first-degree murder, second-degree murder, or voluntary manslaughter."

George whispered to Nancy, "Let's get out of here, Nance. We have to find who framed Frank!"

Nancy nodded. She turned to the officer. "We would like to investigate this case. May we go back to the scene of the crime? We have done other detective works in the past. I'm Nancy Drew."

"Nancy Drew?" The officer's eyebrows shot up. "I've heard of your reputation, young lady. During the last two years you have been solving quite a few cases here in Florida."

Nancy immediately remembered those cases he was talking about. She was at Cape Canaveral, which was also known as Cape Kennedy, to solve the _Mystery of the Moss-Covered Mansion_ when she was sixteen to prove that one of her father's friends was innocent after he had been arrested for sending a truck loaded with explosive oranges into Space Center. When she was seventeen, she went to the Florida Keys to find _The Clues of the Black Keys_ to help find the three keys needed to open an antique trunk and the buried treasure. Then, just a few months ago, she solved _Mystery of Crocodile Island_, where she uncovered a group of suspected poachers in a mysterious island called the Crocodile Island.

"Well, I suppose you won't interfere with the police work…"

"Officer," Frank interrupted, "Is it possible that someone knocked me out and put me down on the chair, killed Sam Cantu, and then placed it in my hand so there would only be my fingerprints?"

The officer thought for a moment. "Well, that can be done, but how do you think the _real _murderer escaped? The room was completely locked when your friends heard the crash. How do you explain that?"

"I don't know _yet_," Frank said. "But even if I were the killer, I would never stay in the same room with the person I killed and hold the murder weapon so I would leave fingerprints on it. If I were he, then I would think of a way out. Please, officer, I need to investigate this case. You can have your men follow me twenty-four hours a day and make sure I don't run away. I need to clear my name."

Finally, the officer nodded. "We already have all the evidence we can find at the crime scene, and by seeing that your father is a prominent private investigator, I can trust you. But don't dare try to make an attempt to run away, Mr. Hardy. I'll have my men follow you."

"Don't worry, officer. I won't."

* * *

"So where do we start?" George asked. 

The five teenagers were back at the inn. Joe looked at the watch. It was already eight o'clock. "I'm starving," he said. "Let's go have dinner first."

The teens went to the car rental agency and rented two cars for their investigations: one silver sedan for the Hardys and one burgundy convertible for Nancy, George, and Ned. After eating dinner at a local restaurant, they went back to the inn. Mrs. Morley was at the reception desk and was surprised to see Frank. "I'm so glad you came back," she said, somewhat ashamed. "I'm sorry I thought you were the killer. When I thought of it, you didn't even talk to him and you would never hurt a fly."

"The police still think I killed Sam Cantu. But I'm determined to find out who killed him." Frank then took out his small notebook he carried with him everyday. "So can you tell us of your alibi?"

Mrs. Morley told the teenage detectives that she and her husband were in their room after they went shopping for food. When they came back and put the food into the kitchen, they didn't see anyone in the dining room. The kitchen was connected to the dining room. At that remark, Ned remembered that there was a third door at the western wall leading to the kitchen. The detectives went to the kitchen because they thought the murderer could have escaped through the window in the kitchen, if there was any.

Unfortunately, their hypothesis was not true. The kitchen had a refrigerator, an oven, a microwave oven, a fan, a counter, and some shelves, but there wasn't a window in sight. The only way for a person to get in there was through the door leading from the dining room, and they knew the killer could not have escaped here.

Mrs. Morley came into the room. "You see? There is no way out."

Joe thought for a moment. "We came back from the trip to the Everglades at five o'clock. We got some rest and when we found the body, it was already six. When were you away, Mrs. Morley?"

The middle-aged woman thought for a moment. "From three to five-forty."

Nancy and George suddenly remembered something. "Yes! I remember!" George shouted. "Nancy and I were down here to read some magazine, and we saw you and Mr. Morley come in through the front door. I remember that was about five-forty."

Frank nodded. "So your alibi is solid so far," he said. "Now we should check the other guests' alibis."

Nancy put her hands into her pocket, and then took it out. "Oh, no. I forgot my notebook in my room," she groaned. "What kind of a detective would forget it? I'll need to go get it from my room."

With those words, she turned around and ran up the stairs. But suddenly, when she got up to the second floor, her foot slipped on some kind of liquid that was poured on the floor.

"Ah!"

As Nancy screamed, her entire body was pushed down the stairs by gravity. She was about to fall ten feet down to the ground!

* * *

_**Postscript: **_**I can't** **believe I finished about one third of the story! Anyway, the mystery still continues for seven more chapters, before the solusion, the motive, and the epilogue in that order. I will post the next chapter as soon as I finish it. But keep reviewing, because when I see five additional reviews, i will update the story :-)**  



	6. Air Tight and Rock Solid Alibis

_**Foreword:**_** A reader told me how stessed she was because I wasn't going to update until I get five reviews. Well, I finished writing this chapter, and even though I only got three reviews for the previous chapter, I decided to update the story. But I really wish my readers can review more because if nobody does, then I won't be able to tell if they like it or not. As I said, not being able to hear from my readers is a big stress for me. So please review for this chapter! Also, I seem to come up with a cliffhanger for every chapter. I think that's because I read so many ND and HB mysteries. I'm sure some of you will be shocked to read the last sentence, guaranteed, especially the illustrious Ned-fan:-)

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_**6**_

_**Air-Tight and Rock-Solid Alibis**_

Frank and Ned were the ones who moved immediately. However, Ned was two yards behind when Frank dashed to break Nancy's fall. He was still a yard away as Frank caught the falling detective, whose eyes were opened wide in fright and surprise. "Thanks, Frank!" she managed to say as she tried to stop trembling.

"That was a close one, Nancy," Joe said, rushing to her with George. "That fall could've killed you or paralyzed you for life!"

Nancy nodded. "I know. Thanks a lot, Frank. I owe you one."

Frank grinned. "Don't mention it. After all, detectives are supposed to help each other."

Ned didn't say anything. He just stared coldly at Frank.

"But what made you fall?" George asked. "It's not as if you were wearing a high heel. In fact, you are wearing a pair of new sneakers you bought just a month ago."

"No," Nancy said, "it's not about my shoes, George. It's about the stuff that was on the top of the staircase."

The detectives went there to investigate. They saw some kind of liquid on the floor. Frank touched and smelled it. "Oil," he said. "It's the usual vegetable oil you use in cooking."

"Vegetable oil?" a voice asked from behind. The teenagers turned around. It was Mrs. Morley. She was coming to see what was causing such a fuss.

Nancy turned to her. "I slipped because of this vegetable oil that was poured on the ground. I have a feeling someone put it there intentionally."

"Oh, my!" Mrs. Morley was surprised. "Someone wanted to hurt you, Nancy?"

"I guess so," Joe answered.

"But why?"

"That we don't know yet."

Mrs. Morley was astonished. "I can't believe this. This vegetable oil is the same kind we use in the kitchen. I know it because the brand I use has a special scent because they used different ingredient to make it. I have to check if someone used it recently."

The brown-haired woman then went straight to the kitchen. Nancy followed her there. When they got there, Mrs. Morley opened the cabinet. "This is where I usually store my supplies," she said. After a while, she took out a bottle of vegetable oil.

"I knew it!" Mrs. Morley shouted. "This has been used recently! When I used it to make myself a cup of tea about forty minutes ago, it was still half full. Of course, an officer was standing by me all along. And he said that I was the only one to come into the kitchen ever since they came. But now, it's not even a third full!"

The rest soon joined. "That figures," Joe said. "Someone has been in here recently."

"Hmm…" Frank was thinking. "When did the police leave?"

"Oh, they finished gathering all the evidence they needed and cleaned the floor after taking the broken vase and the blood sample. They said they still didn't want us disturbing the evidence, so we are supposed to wear gloves when touching anything in here. They talked to us about what our alibis were and left just thirty minutes ago."

Nancy thought for a moment. "That means we have to check with the guests' alibis for the time of the murder and just thirty minutes ago." She looked at Mrs. Morley. "Where were you just thirty minutes ago?"

"I was in my room watching TV all the time. I don't have anyone to prove it."

Nancy quickly jot down what the woman said onto her notebook and nodded toward the others. "Now let's go check the other suspects," she said.

The second person they talked to was Jerome Stuart, who was Patricia's younger brother and Percival and Kent's older brother. He had brown eyes and gray hair. He smiled as he invited the detectives inside his room. "So, what is this about?" he asked them.

Nancy said, "We are here to investigate the murder. I would like to know where you were from five to six."

Jerome seemed to be uncomfortable talking about it. "Do you think one of us is the killer?"

Before Nancy could answer, George interrupted, "We don't know. That's why we are checking your alibi. If it turns out solid, then you obviously are not guilty."

Jerome nodded awkwardly. He sat down onto the chair and took a sip of tea. "I was in my room talking to my friend in Washington. You can call her and she'll tell you that my alibi is solid."

Nancy wrote down the telephone number of the friend he was talking about and kept a mental note to call her later and see if he was telling the truth. And then she asked him what he was doing just thirty minutes ago.

"I was here in my room, of course. Where else would you be in this late?"

"Do you have someone to back it up?" Nancy asked.

"I was calling my friend again and was telling her what happened. She seemed awfully upset."

Nancy nodded. "Well, thank you for your time." As she said so, she motioned the others to go out to the corridor. Frank immediately went to the lobby phone and called the woman with whom Jerome was talking on the phone. She answered it on the fifth ring. The detective asked her if she was talking to Jerome Stuart from five to six. She said yes and told them she had been talking to him almost every week at that time.

Frank jotted down some notes and nodded. He then remembered that the detectives came back at eight o'clock. Then, after talking with Mrs. Morley for fifteen minutes, Nancy ran up the stairs and slipped on the oil deliberately poured on the floor. So thirty minutes before that would be a quarter to eight.

"And I would like to ask one more question," Frank continued. "When did Mr. Stuart call you the second time?"

"Let's see," the woman said. She paused for a moment and said, "That was when my favorite TV show was about to end. I guess he called at seven-thirty and we talked until five minutes ago, which was five minutes before nine-thirty. I remember that because I had been watching TV."

Frank thanked the woman and hung up, then sighed. "His alibi is rock-solid," he said. "That means he couldn't have poured the oil on the floor."

"Then he must be innocent," George said.

"Not quite," Ned stated. "He could have used a cordless phone. I checked that all the phones in here have cords, so he could have brought a cordless phone with him."

"But the problem is," said Joe, "that we can't search his room without a search warrant. Let's just say his alibi is solid for now."

The young detectives went to the third suspect's room. He was Percival, the prominent lawyer. He was occupying the vacant room located on second floor to work. When he heard the knock, he unlocked the door and welcomed the sleuths. "Hello, how may I help you?"

Nancy smiled. "I'm checking everyone's alibi for the time the murder was committed and just thirty—I mean, forty—minutes ago." She quickly said forty because ten minutes had already passed since the police have left.

The attorney thought for a moment and then said, "Well, I was in my room all along, working on my case. I was sending my client some e-mail during the process. When was the murder committed?"

"From five to six," the girl detective answered.

"My computer can prove my innocence," the attorney said, moving aside, showing the teenagers the laptop. "I sent an e-mail approximately every ten minutes while I worked on my case. The computer's history will prove that. It stores the information of when I send and to whom I send my e-mails to."

Frank took seat and began searching. Several moments later, he nodded. "Yes, we have it, Percival. I think that's all we have to ask for now."

As they got out, the detectives thought for a moment again. "His alibi is solid," Joe said, "but his computer is a laptop. He can carry it around any time. And he doesn't even need ten minutes to go to the kitchen, take some of that vegetable oil, and then pour it onto the last step of the staircase. I think we should consider him without an alibi."

The next and the last suspect they visited was Kent, who was the youngest and had blond hair just like Joe. In fact, he was barely ten years older than him. He was very cooperative. His room number was number three and it was the closest one to the second door that led to the dining room, which was locked. Nancy thought he was the most suspicious because he was closest to the dining room so he could have gotten out of there unseen. "Hi, playing detectives as usual, I see," he said cheerily as he opened the door.

George grinned. "Hi. We want to see about your alibi. Where were you from five to six this morning and just fifty minutes ago?"

Kent thought for a moment. "Well, I was out to get myself some dinner and went out at five," he said.

"Dinner? That early?" Frank was suspicious.

"Ha-ha! There's nothing weird about that. You see, I'm a morning person and wake up at five everyday to go to work. So I eat breakfast at five-thirty, lunch at ten, and dinner at five-thirty. In other words, my clock is one to two hours faster than yours."

Nancy nodded. That made sense. She then asked, "Where did you eat at?"

"At Sea Mayhem Café. They serve the best seafood Florida can have."

"And when did you come back?"

"Exactly at six," he said. "That's when I saw everyone gathering at the dining room door, so I went there. And to my surprise, there was a body lying in there."

George nodded. "I saw him enter when all the other guests came to see what happened," she said. "And I think it was impossible for him to send Frank the note, knock him out once he went to the dining room, and then disappear from the room after shattering the vase."

"And what about just fifty minutes ago?"

"I was here. No one can prove it, unfortunately."

"Okay," Nancy said as she jot down what she heard. "Thanks for your time."

As the detectives left the premise, George said, "I think he's clean. His alibi is airtight. Besides…" She blushed. "He's kind of cute, too."

Nancy rolled her eyes. "Didn't you say you were going to wait for Burt to come back?" Burt Eddleton was George's former boyfriend who left the state, like Dave, because he needed training at a more advanced university than the one he was in. Ned stayed there, unlike his friends, and he thought that was what kept his relationship with Nancy steady.

"Oh, don't talk about it!" George said. "I know he'll come back someday."

"Hello?" Joe interrupted George's thought. "We need to find out who was the killer here, George," and, with a wink, he said, "and I don't want you falling in love with a suspect."

"Hey, Joe! Who's the new girl-of-the-week here?" Frank added mischievously. "I'm going to tell Iola that you are flirting with another brunette!"

"No fair!" Joe said. Now it was his turn to blush. "You know how angry she gets when she finds out I was even going close to another girl, especially a dark-haired one!"

Nancy stuck her hands out like a traffic cop. "People! We need to focus on this case, not do some flirting game. I need to find out who framed Frank. We don't have much time before the police gather all the evidence they need. And it's already nine o'clock!"

Everyone looked at the clock. Nancy was right. The old grandfather clock in the lobby rang nine times as it announced the hour.

"I think we should go back to our rooms," George said. "It's been a long day for us, especially for Frank. We'll meet in the morning and discuss this matter. Besides, I want to investigate the _other _murder tomorrow."

The rest nodded in agreement. Nancy wanted to investigate some more, but she knew she was tired and needed some rest. As each of them went to their own rooms, Nancy thought about what they should do tomorrow.

George already went into the room she shared with Nancy. The oil spill was already wiped off the floor, but Nancy took caution anyway. When she was about to open the door, two strong hands grabbed her shoulder and turned her around. Nancy had no time to scream, but she only gasped as she saw the face of the person who grabbed her from behind. "Ned?"

The expression on Ned's face told Nancy that he was serious. He asked her, "Can I talk to you privately?"

Nancy nodded and the two went into Ned's room. Inside, Ned turned to Nancy with a grim expression. The question that came out of her boyfriend's lips shocked Nancy.

"Are you in love with Frank?"

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_**Postscript: **_**One of my readers says she wants to see more Ned-Nancy scenes. Well, here is one. I never really liked romance novels and dreaded soap operas, so don't expect it to be a red-hot love story (no offense to those people who like reading those kinds). Next chapter will be up as soon as I finish it and/or when I get five reviews, as usual.**

**I'll give you some keywords for the next chapter so you'll have an idea what the next chapter will be about. The keywords are: _second murder, motives, Ned's sorrowful past._**


	7. Too Many Motives

_**Foreword: **_**To "nancy drew": I think the name Nedfan is great. But you always said that Nancy and Ned should be together, and your temporary username is "nancy drew". I think the name "nancy nickerson" would sound better for you. It's just my suggestion, so if you want Nedfan, then it's okay. The process of putting your story up is easy: you just have to load the document at Document Manager and post it. There is a Logout link by your username at the top once you log in. And to put stuff in your profile, just go to Account, then click on Profile at the top right corner. I hope I answered all of your questions.**

**Anyway, I wanted to get my readers involved in this mystery, so I came up with a challenge to you. There will be three challenges. The first one will be to see how the killer escaped from the locked room. The second one is the message hidden in the coded message I will show you at the end of this chapter. The last one is the killer's identity.**

**The first and the third challenges will be answered at the end of the story. The answer to the unknown message will be known in the next chapter. Try to find out the message before I give you the answer.**

**Nedfan, a.k.a. nancy drew, told me how Nancy solves more mystery in 57 to 175 of the original series and some in the NDFiles. But I only consider 1 to 56 as originals, since it's impossible for a girl to solve three hundred mysteries in only three years (not to mention most of them are out of print right now), so these stories happen in between _The Thirteenth Pearl_ and _The Triple Hoax_.  
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**This foreword has been a little bit too long, so I will just let you read the newest chapter. Oh, and please review!

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_**7**_

_**Too Many Motives**_

"Why, Ned!" Nancy managed to say. "I think of him as a friend. Nothing more, nothing less."

Ned looked at Nancy with a hurt expression. "I was just…well…confused. You and Frank seemed to be more than just friends."

Nancy was silent. "All I can say is that _you_ are my boyfriend, Ned. I know we sometimes dated different people, but I was always thinking of you. You are the only one meant for me."

Turning around once again, Ned said, "I don't want to lose you, Nancy."

Nancy looked at Ned.

"I don't want to lose another girl I loved," Ned said.

Nancy kept quiet.

"I fell in love with a girl when I was a junior in high school. She was really sweet and nice to me. Then, I found one day that she was just hanging out with me because she wanted to meet the quarterback in my football team. I was really hurt when she dumped me right after we won the championship. I invited her over for dinner as a celebration, but she laughed at me, saying, 'Do you think I was really in love with you?'"

Ned stopped talking. He looked out the window into the darkness outside that covered the entire sky, grass, and trees. "I was really shocked when she left and went to a different party hosted by the quarterback. I hated the feeling. And I promised never to like a girl again. But…" He turned toward Nancy. "Then, I met you at the burning house two years ago."

Nancy remembered every single detail. She nodded.

"And I knew you were different from that girl. I knew you were honest. Honesty really does count, especially when you are dating someone. I trusted you. And I still trust you. I was really worried when I saw you falling down the staircase."

Nancy managed a smile. "I'll be careful."

Ned hugged his girlfriend tightly. "I love you, Nancy."

"Wake up, sleepy bone!" George shouted as she opened the curtains. A bright burst of sunlight shot into the room, making Nancy nearly blind. She opened her eyes lazily. "Come on, out of the bed!" George kept shouting.

Nancy sat up on the bed and rubbed her eyes. When she looked at the clock, it was already seven o'clock.

"Oh, great," Nancy muttered as she changed her clothes from pajamas to the usual street clothes. In less than five minutes, the girls ran out the door and into the corridor. As they did so, Nancy saw Frank and Joe come out of their rooms as well. Frank waved to Nancy and she waved back. She then spotted Ned coming out of the room right next to hers.

Ned smiled warmly at the girl sleuth and said, "So, what's the plan for today?"

"We have to cancel our investigation for the second murder for now. We'll have to investigate the murder that I was asked to solve."

"But first, I'd like some breakfast," Frank said, putting his hand on his stomach. "That hot dog I ate last night wasn't enough."

Joe agreed. "Do we go down to the dining room now?"

Nancy nodded. "They will be serving breakfast anytime now."

When the detectives arrived, all the quests were already at the dining room. Now that Nancy looked at it thoroughly, she noticed that the dining room was quite big. Even though it seemed small from the outside, they could easily seat ten people at the table with a foot of space between each chair. They took their seats.

Mrs. Morley came into the dining room wearing an apron and a broad grin. She was holding a bowl filled with fruits including grapes, oranges, apples, bananas, cherries, and strawberries. Next she brought a loaf of bread and some butter and jam, then a jar filled with orange juice.

Even though the breakfast was simple, the orange juice was very delicious and tasted different from the ones Hannah bought at the local supermarket. Nancy smiled. "This is really marvelous, Mrs. Morley," she commented.

"Thank you, Nancy," the cook said. "I hope you'll have a good day."

As Nancy and her friends finished breakfast, they went out to the orange orchards and started investigating. When they got to the scene of the first murder, Nancy saw the sets of footprints leading to the cliff and back. There were yellow police tapes surrounding the area.

Nancy noted that there were two sets of footprints. One was leading to the cliff and the other one went to the cliff and came back.

"According to the police, the day Christina died, the ground was muddy because the rain had been falling for a whole day. She was found with a broken neck and it appears that someone had pushed her down the cliff," Nancy said grimly. "And I guess the person got away with murder."

Joe was thinking. "We don't know why she was here or why she was pushed."

"Maybe she was pushed because she was here," Frank suggested. "But why was she here? Who was here with her?"

"We can't solve any mystery if we just stand here," Ned said. "We'd better find out about Christina in person."

Nancy smiled and nodded. Sometimes, she was really amazed at Ned's detective skill and his logical mind.

_Maybe, _she would think, _someday, Ned and I can open a detective agency. Drew-Nickerson Agency? No, Nickerson-Drew sounds better, for some reason…_

_Oh, what am I thinking? _Nancy shook her head to clear away her daydreaming. _This is time for some investigative works, not a time to daydream!_

"I suggest that we go to her friends and ask if anyone held a grudge against her," the detective with the titian-colored hair said. The others agreed.

"Usually, there are three kinds of motive for murder," Frank said. "First one is for revenge. A person, like Bailey in our more recent case, for instance, can hate another person so much she decided that the only way to please herself was to kill the other person.

"The second type is money. People do many strange things for money. For instance, the wealthy couple in our last case wanted money desperately they didn't care if they had to put an innocent girl behind bars.

"And the third is accidental. This doesn't count as motive, but when a person has seen another person do something illegal, the person breaking the law will have no choice but to kill the witness."

Joe pretended to yawn. "Is the seminar over yet, Professor Frank Hardy?" he asked teasingly. "When will we get a chance to interview her friends?"

Nancy grinned. "I think it's time to pay a visit to Christina's room…"

The detectives went to Mr. Percival Stuart, Christina's husband. He was typing on his laptop when he heard a knock on the door. "Yes?" he asked when he opened the door. He saw the detectives' faces and smiled, letting them inside. Once they were all inside, Percival sat down and asked, "Well, what is it that you want now?"

"We want to search Christina's room," Nancy said. "That way, we can find out who had been in contact recently and find out if she had enemies."

Percival seemed happy that the detectives were working on the case. He said yes and told them to ask his sister for the key to Christina's room, which was the vacant one on the second floor. Because police didn't want the evidences to be disturbed, they had asked Percival to move to a different room. That was a good idea, Nancy thought, since he could be the killer and he could tamper with the room as much as he wanted.

Mrs. Morley nodded as they explained to her the situation. She took out a key and then went to the key stocker. Nancy looked at how all the keys were hung on the key stocker, with the room number written on a piece of paper that had been taped on each key. Mrs. Morley explained that when a person wanted to get the key, the person couldn't take it out because he didn't have the key to unlock the key stocker. She usually kept the key, so nobody could steal it. She said that she must be careful, since the key was a special kind and couldn't be duplicated. It was also impossible to pick on the lock.

Nancy was then handed the key for Christina's room. The five teenagers went up there and unlocked the door. It was room number ten, the room right in the middle of the second floor and with only one window. The only thing they could see out of the window was the dimly lit corridor. When they entered, it was pitch black. They turned on the light and saw a table, a queen-size bed, two chairs, a closet, and a door leading to the bathroom.

The first thing the detectives looked at was the table. There were quite a few letters on it. Nancy told the others to put on their gloves they bought at a store right after eating dinner. They did as told and started investigating the room to see if they could find any more clues.

Nancy carefully opened the letters. They were already opened, so Nancy had no problem taking out the letters inside without ruining the envelope, which she thought was important. She looked at the first letter. This one was from a friend in Louisiana. Her name was Adrienne Lupus.

"All it talks about is how she is doing in Louisiana after moving two months ago. It seems like this Adrienne was writing to Christina every week," Nancy muttered. "Hmm…?"

Something in the letter caught her eyes. "This sentence says, 'I hope Patricia and you made up.' And the one after it says, 'I know you didn't do it on purpose, but I heard from you how mad she became when you dropped and broke her prized vase when you were cleaning it.'"

She looked up. Frank was reading the letter from behind her. "I think we should consider Mrs. Morley a suspect as well," he muttered, giving Nancy a wink.

Ned was a little impatient when he saw Nancy with Frank. Quickly he asked, "Does the letter say anything else?"

"Let's see…" Nancy read the entire letter and shook her head. "But I'm sure there are a lot more to look from."

She looked at the pile of letters on the table in front of her. She then caught something shiny and brown beneath the pile of letters. She looked at it. It was a wooden picture frame. The girl detective turned it around. Her eyes got wide as she saw the people in the picture. "Look!" she told to Ned. Ned looked at it and nodded.

"Christina looks just like Mr. Chandler!"

Nancy saw that Christina was standing with Mr. and Mrs. Morley, Jerome, Percival, and Kent in the picture. They all were standing in front of the Orange Farm Inn. They were all smiling and looked a little younger. She took the photo out and looked at the back of the photograph. It was taken in October, but Nancy couldn't see what day. But she could see that they took the photograph less than seven years ago. The caption said: "Opening Party of Orange Farm Inn."

"So this bed-and-breakfast was built seven years ago?" Ned asked as he saw the picture. Nancy shrugged.

"I don't know, but they opened the inn seven years ago. The inn itself might have been here for years, maybe decades or centuries."

Nancy put the picture back into the frame and looked through the pile of letter once again.

Joe, meanwhile, was searching the closet. He took out a suitcase that had the initial CCS on it. "Must stand for Christina Chandler Stuart," he hypothesized. When he opened it, he saw Christina's clothes and an envelope. It seemed to be there for a long time. He opened the envelope and took out the piece of paper that was in it.

"This is a divorce paper!"

Joe couldn't believe it. He looked at the names. Sure enough, it had the names Christina Chandler Stuart and Percival Stuart printed on it.

"I think I got one person who got a motive to kill right here," he muttered to himself with a grin.

George was in the bathroom. There was a book placed on the rack right above the toilet seat. "What's this?" She took the book out. It was a mystery novel. She opened it to the page which had the bookmark placed. The brunette then found that it was not a bookmark. It was a piece of paper with a couple of handwritten paragraphs. The first one started with "Dear Jenny," so she was sure it was a letter written to a friend of hers. She read the entire letter.

" '…Jerome has been a successful mystery writer because he stole my idea from my notebook. I always wrote the ideas I had for a mystery down on it. I don't know how he got it, but the concept and the idea is the exact same thing as the one I came up with. I'll have to talk to him and tell him that if he doesn't give me half the money he earned from the sale of the book, then I will tell my lawyer about it.'"

George thought for a moment. "So Jerome was somehow involved in this, too… I wonder if this caused him to kill her!"

Frank was looking at the letters. He picked them up one by one, but all he could find were junk mails and bills. "Not unusual," he thought. Then, he saw Joe and George coming toward the trio with grins on their faces.

"I found a person who has a motive to kill Christina," said Joe.

"I found a person who could have killed Christina," said George.

The two said it at once, and when they noticed that, they broke out laughing. "Okay, you first, George," Joe said.

The brunette told the other four detectives about the book and the letter she found in the bathroom, and Joe told the rest about the divorce paper he found in the closet. Nancy knew that nearly all the guests had motive to kill Christina.

"But we don't have one for Kent so far," she said.

"I knew he wasn't involved," said George. She looked quite relieved.

"I don't know about that," Frank said. "Remember, everyone is a suspect in this case."

Ned was looking at the bed when he saw something gray sticking out from underneath the bed. He crouched down and took it out. It was a newspaper dating several weeks ago. As he looked at the newspaper, he saw that it was the personals section. And he saw one of the personals circled with a red pen.

He read it: " '**Weil loll mien eats ants clod, road lad, or lain Edo root; see site. Keel nets.**'"

"Huh?" Nancy looked at him. She then noticed what Ned was holding.

"This is the personal ad posted on this newspaper dated like a few weeks ago. I found it under the bed."

Nancy looked at it. "It looks like a coded message!"

"And Christina circled it," Frank said as he looked at the message. "I think it might be a clue!"

"But we'll have to decode it first," George said.

Frank nodded. When he looked up, he could see a faint outline of a person right outside the curtained window. He immediately stood up when he noticed it. Immediately, the shadow fled to the staircase. Now everyone else noticed it. The person must have been eavesdropping in on the conversation inside!

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**_Postscript: _The message, which is typed in bold letters, is the one I want you to find out before I get five reviews and update my story. If you figure out the message, let me know by e-mailing me your answer or tell me your answer in your review. Good luck! And please review!  
**

**The keywords for the next chapter: _skip in rhythm, meeting place, forbidden relationship._**


	8. Meeting Place

**_Foreword: _Okay, so this chapter reveals the answer to the cryptic code mentioned in chapter seven. Nobody took my hint of "Skip in rhythm," but oh well... Better luck in finding the real killer! Here is the eighth chapter. There are four more chapters before revealing who the killer is. Enjoy, and please review!

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_**8**_

_**Meeting Place**_

Frank immediately dashed to the door. But when he got out, nobody was in the corridor. He bit his lower lip. This time, the eavesdropper got away. He knew it was no use to go after him, since he could have escaped through the front door or he could have hid in his room, if he was one of the guests staying in the inn. And Frank had a hunch that he was.

"Ignore the eavesdropper," George said dismissively. "I want to find out what this message said."

Nancy looked at the date. "It's a newspaper dating exactly a week from the day Christina was killed!" said the girl detective, surprised. "I think this may lead us to another suspect."

George thought for a moment. "Wait a minute, Nancy," she said as she finished thinking. "Isn't this like the message you decoded in the _Mystery of the Moss-Covered Mansion_?"

Nancy suddenly remembered the details. She was asked by her father to decode a certain personals ad posted on a Florida newspaper. It was a striking coincidence!

"That time, I used the first, fifth, ninth, and thirteenth words to find out the message. Maybe if I do this for this one…"

Nancy took out her notebook and began decoding. She first began by writing the message down: "Weil loll mien eats ants clod, road lad, or lain Edo root; see site. Keel nets." Then, she took out the first, fifth, ninth, and thirteenth words from the text and wrote them down underneath the original message. When she finished, she read:

"Weil ants or see."

For an instant, nobody said anything. But after a while, George and Joe started chuckling. Then, all of the detectives were laughing at the hilarious sentence Nancy just read. "That's a weird message!" George commented.

Nancy knew it was not the right one. She scratched her head. "Maybe I should take the first letter of each word and make words out of them. Let's see… WLMEACRLOLERSSKN."

"Doesn't make much sense, either," Frank said.

The detectives then tried the second letter of each word. But it still didn't make sense. They did the last letter of every word but found nothing.

"Do you think the letters stand for another one in the alphabet?" Joe suggested.

Nancy shook her head. "That's not possible. You don't usually see real words after you do it in that format. But all these are real words. What's the chance of jumbling up the alphabet and still get sixteen real words? I don't think that's the case."

George knew it would take forever trying to break the code. She then had an idea in mind. She turned to the message and read: "**Will meet at Coral Dr. and Rose St. Kent.**"

Nancy was surprised. "How did you figure that out, George?" she asked, amazed.

George grinned. "All you had to do was read every other letter."

She took the notepad and started crossing out letters. The brunette wrote down the letters without the spaces, commas, and semi-colon. It came out like this:

WeillollmieneatsantsclodroadladorlainEdorootseesiteKeelnets.

First, she crossed out "e" and "l" in "Weil". She then crossed out "o" and the third "l" from the second word "loll". After doing the entire message, the detectives saw the message George had read earlier:

WillmeetatcoraldrandrosestKent.

Will meet at coral dr and rose st Kent.

Will meet at Coral Dr. and Rose St. Kent.

Everyone was amazed at George's decoding ability.

"You are truly an expert!" Ned complimented. George grinned.

"That's because I've been Nancy's best friend for years. I guess I got her sleuthing ability!"

But then Nancy looked at the name at the end of the message. "Kent… I'll bet it stands for Kent Stuart!"

Five minutes later, the detectives were in front of Kent's room knocking on his door. Kent opened with a welcoming smile. But his smile didn't last long when he heard what happened from the detectives and what they had found out. He grimaced.

"Okay," he said, "Christina and I were in love."

This shocked the entire group. Kent then continued as if he didn't notice. "She had been very nice to me because I had lost my job at a company I had worked for two years. She then offered me the job here in Orange Farm Inn and in the plantation. She said she love me more than her husband and told me she was going to leave him. I knew instantly that it meant divorce. I told her not to, but she was determined."

Nancy and George looked at each other quizzically. Could it mean that Christina's husband, Percival, had killed his wife?

"Time to talk to Percival," George said after the detectives said goodbye to the young blond suspect.

Percival didn't answer when the detectives knocked on his door. "Is he away?" Nancy muttered.

"He's away to the court meeting today," Mrs. Morley said. She appeared from behind the detectives, and the voice surprised them.

"Oh, hi, Mrs. Morley," George said, turning around. "I heard Christina broke your vase a while ago."

Mrs. Morley's smile disappeared. "How did you know that?"

"I heard from one of Christina's friends," Nancy replied.

"Well." Mrs. Morley put down the broom she was holding. It seemed like she was going to clean the corridor. "That vase was my most treasure thing. But I forgave her, of course. Who would keep whining about a silly old vase for weeks?"

"But it _was_ precious and expensive, wasn't it?"

"Yes. It was made for the queen in a European country. My grandmother got her hands on it and gave it to me. I think it would be worth nearly a hundred thousand dollars if we had sold it in auction. It was truly a wonderful piece of artwork."

Mrs. Morley sighed. She then said she had work to do and went downstairs.

Nancy stood there in silence. Maybe this could be the motive, if Mrs. Morley actually killed her brother's wife. But she doubted it. Many questions were yet unanswered, and talking to suspects surely multiplied the number of unanswered questions.

They then went to the second floor and visited Jerome's room. He wasn't there.

"Figures," Joe said. He turned to the others. "Well? What do we do next?"

Nancy looked at the notepad. "We already know where Kent and Christina had met. I think we should go there to investigate. Maybe they had a fight about the marriage and divorce. I have a hunch that someone can tell us about the couple."

The detectives went there in their two separate cars and got there at the same time. Nancy looked at the street names.

"Coral Road and Rose Street. This must be it!"

The place was a restaurant. Its name was "Fast Sea Vikings." It was a fairly small restaurant that could fit only about two-dozen customers in it at a time. Nancy looked at the others and went inside.

"Welcome to Fast Sea Vikings!" a cheery voice greeted them. "I'm Paul Erickson. How many I help you?"

George almost laughed at the name. Erickson? That was the last name of Leif Eriksson, one of the most famous Vikings in the history, who was thought to have discovered North America. And the name fitted very well with the name of the restaurant. She thought it was a nickname, but when she looked at the man, who had a long beard and mustache, a huge stomach, muscular build, and a hat with two horns sticking out from it, she was sure he could have jumped out of the history textbook that talked about the sixteenth century.

After the group was seated, the man gave them five menus. George was shocked to see yet another menu filled with seafood. "I knew Florida was three-fourth surrounded by water, but I had no idea all the people there ate was fish!"

"Relax," Frank said. "Here is 'Fast Sea', which means 'fast food' and 'seafood' combined. I'm sure there is a section that mentions hamburgers or pizzas."

Frank was right. George was elated when she had found the fast food menu and ordered a hamburger combo. Meanwhile, Nancy asked the waiter if he had worked here for a long time. The waiter seemed like he was Mexican and didn't speak a lot of English. But he did mention that he was hired just two weeks ago. Nancy asked if he knew a couple that came to the store on a certain day of every week. The waiter said he remembered, but he didn't remember their names.

"Can you tell me about them?" Frank asked.

The waiter said he remembered the couple just because they had been having a fight at the hotel just two weeks ago, when he was hired there as a waiter. He saw that they were arguing about divorce and elopement. He didn't know what they meant, but he remembered that the store owner, who was the man they had met earlier, was really upset about the whole incident that drove a couple of customers away.

Nancy thought for a moment. This meant that Kent was arguing with Christina about divorce and elopement. She looked at her friends. "So Kent was telling the truth about he and Christina secretly dating."

Frank crossed his arms across his chest. "A woman was having affairs with her husband and his brother. Maybe she refused to marry him so he killed her."

"Or her husband found that out and killed her instead," Joe added. "Either way, all the people at the inn are suspects."

"Let's go back to the inn to find out more," Nancy said. "I want to search Sam Cantu's room to find if the same thing goes for him, too."

When the detectives got to the inn, it was almost lunchtime. They could smell the delicious aroma of food cooking coming out from the chimney that led to the kitchen. Nancy realized that there was also an oven in the kitchen.

Could the killer have climbed out of the chimney and escaped?

No, it wasn't possible. She knew that all chimneys had the special net placed above, and in the summertime, the net is supposed to stay on. It was a good guess, but she knew it wasn't possible.

Nancy looked at the muddy ground around the house.

"Hey, it's almost time to eat, Nancy," Frank called.

"I'll go later. Can you guys wait in the lobby? We can eat after we search Sam's room."

"Okay," Frank said with a shrug. He then closed the door and Nancy was alone outside. She looked into her purse but didn't find a magnifying glass inside. She groaned again. It was the second time she forgot one of her detective tools in her room! She quickly went into the bed-and-breakfast.

George was in the dining room looking at the tapes placed in the room by the police when Nancy went back into her room. George decided to see if Nancy found any clue outside. But when she got out, nobody was there. The brunette looked at the side of the house and saw a shoeprint.

"Huh?"

George was surprised. Why would someone walk over the muddy lawn? She remembered that it had rained for two days before the detectives got to the farm. That meant that a person must have walked on the lawn recently, probably yesterday or today. Looking at the shoeprint, George could see that it was made quite recently.

"I wonder if this was made by the killer?" George muttered.

Just then, she heard something move behind her. George was surprised and turned around instinctively. But she didn't see the person's face, for she was hit at the back of her head and blacked out.

* * *

The first thing she heard was the cracking of a wooden object. 

The first thing she smelt was the smell of burning wood.

The first thing she saw was the red flame burning in front of her.

And the first thing she felt was the pain in her wrists and ankles.

George realized where she was in an instant. She was in the shack in the farm where the farmers kept the tools! She quickly tried to sit up, but the ropes that tied her hands and feet were too tight. The more she moved her hands and feet, the more the ropes hurt.

The dark-haired girl tried to scream, but her mouth had been covered with handkerchief, preventing her even from whispering for help.

The athletic brunette tried to stay calm and think.

_What if I were Nancy? What would I do to escape?_

George thought as hard as she could. But the flames got hotter and hotter. It spread throughout the small shack, burning every wooden thing in its path. Smoke filled George's nostrils and she almost choked.

_How can I survive?_

_Will I survive?_

George closed her eyes tightly. Drops of tears rolled down her cheeks.

_Help me… Help me, Nancy!

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**Postscript: **_**George is again not just in hot water, but in hot shack as well. Will she be rescued before she would be burnt to a crisp? You'll find out after I get five reviews (as always).**

**Ragna--I'm sorry if the give-me-five-reviews-or-I-won't-update tactic is irritating you, but I want to hear from my readers about how they feel about the story and whether I made another mistake in the story, etc. But I _will _review after a week even when I get no review at all for that chapter.  
**

**Keywords for the next chapter: Joe Hardy on the rescue, skeletons in Sam's closet.  
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	9. Fiery Chamber

_**Foreword: **_**I got one more review than I thought I'd get! I think this chapter is most exciting so far, with more action than the previous ones. Enjoy, and please review!**_  
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9**_

_**Fiery Chamber**_

Unfortunate for George, nobody noticed her disappearance until ten minutes later.

The first one to notice something was Joe. He had a strange feeling that something was wrong. He, Frank, and Ned were waiting at the lounge when Nancy came downstairs. "Where's George?" he asked the girl detective.

Nancy looked around. "I thought she was with you guys."

Ned thought for a moment. "She went inside first and we went a few seconds after her. She wasn't in the lobby, so I thought she went to her room. Frank, Joe, and I waited here when you came in and ran up the stairs."

"I was just getting my magnifying glass. I didn't see George in my room."

This stunned Frank. "We have to find her!"

The group quickly went outside. Nancy went to the place where she had last been and looked down. She saw a set of footprints belonging to a pair of shoes worn by a woman. She knew it belonged to George. She then saw that someone had dragged George into the orange farm!

"That person couldn't have gone too far," Frank said. "It's only been ten minutes since George disappeared."

The detectives followed the two lines. The orange farm was quite huge. Nancy saw many trees, but only half of them had oranges on it. The foursome ran faster, hoping that George was safe.

"That kidnapper must have moved pretty slow, since he was carrying George with him and couldn't run very fast. We are running at approximately twelve miles per hour and the kidnapper must have dragged George at the rate of three to four miles per hour, judging from the tracks made," Frank said. "Which means we'll catch on to the kidnapper any time now…"

Joe smelt the sickening odor of burning wood when they ran for a few minutes. His instinct told him that George was in danger. The detectives came to a burning cabin in the farm. It was half covered with flame.

"Who could've done this?" Ned asked, looking for something to put the fire out with. He noticed a hose nearby. Turning on the knob, he blasted cold water straight toward the flame.

It was not much help. The flame spread quickly than the detectives expected, and it was devouring the small cabin.

Suddenly, Joe noticed something on the ground nearby the cabin. His eyes got huge with surprise. It was a shoe belonging to George!

"It must have fallen off as the captor dragged her into the cabin!" Frank deduced. "That means George is still in there!"

"But the flame's spreading out too quickly!" Nancy said, raising her arms up to her face to cover the heat produced by the fire and to protect her face from the fire.

Joe didn't hesitate. He took the hose and pointed straight toward himself and turned the nozzle. Immediately, a blast of cold water shot out and down Joe's head to his shoe. Now, he was completely soaked. Taking a huge breath of air, he ran straight into the fire!

"Joe!" Frank shouted in astonishment. "It's too dangerous! You'll kill yourself!"

By the time Frank shouted out the last word, the fire covered the cabin completely. Its deadly heat and gas blanketed the small wooden shed and was about to make it collapse onto two hapless detectives who were in the shed!

George was tied down and was unable to move. The handkerchief covering her mouth prevented her from shouting, and she coughed each time she took a small breath. Her body couldn't take the heat, and her lung couldn't take the gas. Would it be the end of the brunette?

Joe was surprised to find out how big the shed was inside. Even though it looked like a one-room cabin, there were actually four rooms, each carrying some equipment used to harvest the fruit grown in the farm. And he spotted two feet in the room right beyond the open door.

Knowing it was George, Joe dashed into the room. Everything in the room but the floor was ablaze, and, fortunately, George was lying down on the floor, safe from fire. At least, she was temporarily safe from fire, but she was inhaling the toxic gas produced.

George opened her eyes, hoping to find Burt Eddleton coming to rescue her from the fire, but she saw Joe hurrying toward her, kicking the burning equipments away as he went toward her. George raised her eyes and saw that the ceiling was about to collapse! Joe took the handkerchief off her mouth so she could speak. The first thing she shouted was, "Look out! The ceiling's going to collapse!"

And it did. But Joe and George were in the other room when it fell down. Unfortunately, the room they went to was not the one with the door; it was the one facing the cliff. Joe ran into that room because all three other rooms' ceilings had collapsed, and there was no way for the two of them to escape.

But the last standing room was about to collapse as well. Joe and George exchanged nervous glances. Above them was the burning ceiling that could fall down any moment. In front of them was a room completely covered with fire. Around them was the toxic gas. And behind them was a cliff approximately thirty feet above sea level.

Joe searched his pockets and took out a Swiss army knife he was always carrying with him. He used it to cut the rope binding George's wrists and ankles. George was even more surprised when she understood what she and Joe were about to do.

They were going to jump off the cliff.

George looked down and saw the Atlantic Ocean. She had grown seeing and loving the ocean back in River Heights, but when she saw it now, it seemed scarier than ever. Joe was thinking the same thing, but he knew this was the only way to escape.

"Ready?" Joe asked George with a grin.

"Ready when you are," George replied, returning his grin.

"Alright… One, two…Jump!" Joe shouted. Together, the two jumped into the ocean below just as the ceiling of the room they were in collapsed.

Frank, Nancy, and Ned were desperately trying to put the flames out. But all they could do was spray water using the small gardening hose used to water flowers and grass. When the fire would go out, the two in the shed would be dead for sure.

The detectives hoped that Joe and George would come out of the fire, but when the ceilings collapsed at once, they just watched in despair and shock. The fire was still spreading throughout the shed, and as time passed, it grew larger. That was when they heard a loud splashing sound. It sounded like something had fallen into the ocean beneath the cliff!

The three teenagers quickly went to see what happened. They saw two figures splashing in the water, trying to reach the shore. "Nancy!" shouted one of the figures. It was George!

Frank shouted, "Hang on! We'll be right there!"

A few minutes later, the three teenagers went to the spot where the two teenagers had jumped in. Frank used the gardening hose to bring the two to the shore. George gasped for air when she reached the shore.

"What happened, George?" questioned Nancy. "And are you all right?"

George took a deep breath. "Yeah, I'm all right. As for what happened, I don't really know." She looked at the burning cabin. "All I know is that when I went outside, I saw a shoeprint near the hotel. I thought it could have been made by someone within twenty-four hours. Then, I was hit on the head and knocked out. When I opened my eyes, I was in the burning shed with my hands and feet tied and my mouth covered with the handkerchief."

"A shoeprint?" Nancy asked.

Frank said, "Maybe George was almost killed because she found the shoeprint. That means it could be a vital clue! Let's go back to the bed-and-breakfast and see for ourselves."

Back at the inn, the detectives looked at the place where George had been earlier, but no shoeprint could be found. George went to the exact place where she had seen it, but someone had erased the shoeprint cleanly, leaving no clue for the detectives after all. Because Joe and George were wet, the two decided to change clothes and then search Sam Cantu's room later.

Frank, Ned, and Nancy decided to wait downstairs by Sam's room while Joe and George went to change their clothes. When they were upstairs, George smiled at Joe and said, "Thanks for what you did, Joe."

Joe looked stunned for a moment, but then grinned. "It's what I do best!"

A few minutes later, the detectives knocked on the door to see if Mrs. Morley was in her room. She was, and she greeted the detectives with a smile and asked if they needed anything. Nancy returned the key of Christina's room back and asked if they could borrow the key of Sam Cantu's room. The middle-aged lady nodded and gave them the key.

All the furniture in the room was identical to those in Christina's room. The detectives searched the drawers and suitcases for clues.

The detectives talked for a while and decided that Nancy should search the bathroom. George decided to look in the cabinet. Ned went and looked in the drawers. Frank searched the bed, and Joe looked in the suitcase.

The detectives continued their search without a word spoken from anyone.

Nancy opened the compartment in which people usually stored their toiletries and found nothing unusual.

George looked in the cabinet, but all she could find were suits and ties hanging from the hangers. She decided to look into the pockets of the suits.

Ned opened all three of the drawers. He found many documents and books. "I hope this won't take long," he said.

Frank looked under the mattresses. He didn't find anything interesting and decided to look under the sheets. He again found nothing.

Joe opened the suitcase and found clothes and toiletries neatly put away. He took the clothes away and searched the bottom of the suitcase. The reason he did so was because he heard about the people who hid important objects in hidden compartments. When he felt the bottom of the suitcase, he noticed something odd.

"There seems to be a false bottom," he muttered.

The detective needed a way to open the barrier that prevented him from seeing what was inside the hidden compartment. When he flipped the suitcase upside down, he found that there was a small drawer under the suitcase. He pulled the small knob sticking out from the suitcase.

A secret compartment came out like a drawer.

Joe called to Frank and the dark-haired detective came to see what his brother had found. Inside the drawer there were many letters bundled up.

None of the letters seemed suspicious, so he put them back, but a small, black envelope fell out of the bunch, and it caught the two brothers' attention.

It was about five inches by seven inches. There was no sender or recipient's address, so they opened it. When they opened it, they saw a chilling message written on the black sheet of paper. The message was spelled with letters cut out of magazines, like the threatening notes sent to people so the sender's handwriting could not be verified.

The letters were all in black fonts. The Hardys deduced that they were cut out from newspaper articles and advertisements. Joe slowly read the message, remembering every word of it:

"You will pay for what you did, Samuel Cantu. You will pay…"

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_**Postscript: **_**I hope you enjoyed this chapter. The keywords for the next chapter are: threat, blackmail, dangers en route.**


	10. Something to Hide

_**Foreword: **_**Thank you for the reviews! I just need four more reviews for me to break my record!  
**

**To Belladonna: In my previous novel, _Missing in Action_, I already mentioned that in my stories, River Heights is in New Jersey, not Illinois. The reason I did so is because I wanted Nancy and the Hardy Boys to be closer together, so they could solve more mysteries. Also, this story takes place between _The Thirteenth Pearl _and _The Triple Hoax_, since I only wanted Nancy to solve 56 mysteries (no more, no less) and because I only consider the original series to be...well...original!**

**If you didn't, read my previous story. It will familiarize you with the style I write in.**

**Anyway, that's all I need to say for now. Enjoy the tenth chapter and please review (as always). Oh, and by the way, I _will _complete the story by the end of this year at the latest. I'm not the person to leave my works unfinished. Once again, enjoy this chapter.**

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_**10**_

_**Something to Hide**_

"What does it mean?"

The person who asked this was Joe Hardy. He was puzzled to find a threatening note in the victim's suitcase. Could this be the note sent by the murderer?

Frank studied the note. Then, he looked at the envelope. "It seems like this letter was sent from Florida quite recently."

"How do you know that?" Joe asked.

"The sender used a stamp with the picture of Kennedy Space Center on it. This stamp was released to the public just a few weeks ago."

"So you think that the person who sent the letter was from Florida?"

Frank nodded. "I'm not completely positive, but I think so. I don't think a person would come from another state and then buy a stamp sold in Florida. If my guess is right, the person who sent the threat is the one who murdered Sam and framed me for the murder. When this letter was sent to Sam, he was still living in Wisconsin, so this proves that the person who sent this letter and possibly killed him was from Florida and lived there or stayed there for a long time, or at least a few weeks.

"So that proves that the residents in this hotel are more likely to be suspects now."

"I see…" Joe said. "If you're right, which you are most the time, then the killer might be the ones who actually live in this state. That means Mrs. Morley, Mr. Morley, Percival, Jerome, and Kent."

But then, Joe was confused. "But wait… If Sam got this threatening letter, why didn't he tell the police about it and keep it a secret?"

His brother thought for a moment. "I think I know why."

Ned Nickerson looked at the bunch of letters in front of him. He sighed, then started looking at them one by one. It was easy sorting the letters into three categories: the junk, the business, and the personal. The most difficult part was telling the difference between a junk mail and a business letter. The ones sent personally to Sam from his friends and family were easy to spot because the addresses were handwritten and the letter had stamps. After ten minutes of agonizing work, he leaned back onto the back of the chair.

"Whew! My eyes are sore already!" he murmured. He rubbed his eyes gently and opened them again. Now, in front of him, was an envelope without a stamp. He took it and looked at it. The sender was Sam Cantu, and the recipient was Percival Stuart. "Huh? What's this?"

This was obviously a letter which Sam wanted to send to Percival but never did. But something odd struck Ned's mind. Percival was staying in the same inn that Sam was staying! Why would Sam send a letter to the person who lives just a few yards away from the room he was staying at?

Ned opened the letter. The strange thing was that the recipient's address was the inn, but the sender's address was in Wisconsin. "So that's where Sam lived before he came here to stay for vacation," he murmured. "So Sam must have written this letter before he came here."

The teenager knew this was a violation of privacy and law, but he reminded himself that it was an investigation. Besides, the sender was already dead. He couldn't complain even if he wanted to.

The message was short and simple. Sam only wrote a paragraph that took up only three lines on the lined sheet of paper.

But the moment Ned read the message, his eyes got wide with surprise.

Nancy Drew closed the compartment in the restroom. She took a cursory look at the bathroom. There was a toilet, a garbage bin, and the shower. Sam obviously didn't use the shower, since the packages of soap and conditioning shampoo provided by the inn wasn't opened and the shower cap was dry. So Nancy made a guess that Sam never spent a night there, unless he was the person who didn't shower daily.

"Yuck," Nancy muttered disgustedly as her imagination ran wild again. She sat down onto the toilet seat and thought for a moment.

"If Sam never spent a night here, then he wouldn't make an enemy here in Miami. So the killer must have known Sam from a long time ago. Hmmm… I think I should talk to the Morleys, Percival, Jerome, and Kent. Those five are my prime suspects in this case!"

George took her hands out of the pockets of the suit she was searching. She had been assigned to the cabinet, and all she could find were ties and suits. Nothing seemed interesting until the moment she felt something.

"A piece of paper?" George was surprised. She opened the crumpled piece of paper. Inside there were names written on it. The list of names started with Eladio Anton to Alberto Zarco.

"Hmmm… They sure sound Spanish," George muttered. "I took Spanish when I was in high school, and these names are like the names that come up on the textbook. I wonder why Sam was keeping a list… Maybe these are the names of his friends in Miami. After all, there are many Spanish-speaking people in Miami."

George searched the other pocket. There she found a small notebook. She opened it and read the first page:

"My summerhouse in Miami: 549 Sabal Palm Road, Miami FL 33137."

The brunette quickly jotted down the address and pushed the note into her pocket. She then flipped the page. To her surprise, all the other pages were torn out of the book! Why did Sam do this? Was it because he kept valuable information in the notebook? Or is it because…

George then thought for a moment.

Wait a minute! Sam's keeping a list of Spanish names, he had been killed, he had a summerhouse in Miami, and the pages had been torn off in his small notebook?

Was it he who tore the notes away or was it someone else who thought the information would be dangerous for him if the police had found it? And did that person kill Sam so he wouldn't leak the information to the authority?

George's expression changed. "I have to tell the others," she whispered to herself. "The killer must be in this inn!"

Unbeknownst to George, everyone else in the room already found out some sort of clue leading to the fact that one of the five suspects in the inn was the murderer. The information they had uncovered led to the assurance that the killer wasn't from outside the inn; he was inside all along.

All five detectives were ready to share their findings. The first person was Nancy. She told them about the unused toiletries. Then came George. Frank and Joe told the others what they had found in the suitcase, and Ned was the last one to tell them the shocking news.

"I just found this letter Sam was planning to send to Percival. I'll read the paragraph: 'The process was successful. Another 200 had been brought in this week. Expect payment by end of month. SC.'"

"What? Process? 200?" George asked. She and Joe seemed perplexed. Nancy and Frank, on the other hand, got the message.

"Those two are bringing in illegal aliens!" Nancy shouted. "Now I get it! I think the reason Sam was killed has something to do with the illegal importing of Mexican workers!"

George and Joe were still confused.

"How can they do that?"

"Follow me." It was Frank. He went to the door and opened it. He gestured the others to follow him. "I think I know how they did it," he murmured. The detectives went out from the front door quietly. Mrs. Morley wasn't there, so they were sure that they weren't being watched. When he got outside, Frank turned right and went to the direction of the burned cabin.

Nancy got the idea, too. She went after Frank and kept the pace up. The others followed silently.

When they got to the cliff, Frank carefully walked through the path that led to the shore. When he got to the shore, he looked around.

Then, Frank found what he was looking for. "I found it!" he said to the others. They all went to see the discovery.

Frank pointed to the shallow water just a few feet away from them. There was an anchor beneath the surface. "It looks like it was there for a short time. I think it's been like that for less than a week.

"So the importing of illegal aliens was done here. Sam and Percival must have stopped the ship here and brought the foreigners here. And they might have had a car parked nearby to take them to Miami, where they would be released."

"I can't believe it!" George said in awe.

"So in order to get a solid clue, we must go to the summerhouse George mentioned earlier," Nancy said.

"And I found the key, too," George mentioned. "It was in the same pocket where he kept his notebook."

The detectives agreed upon going to the summerhouse to investigate more.

It took the teenagers one and a half hours to get to the summerhouse Sam mentioned. The house was a two-storied building located right along Biscayne Bay. It was north of highway I-95 and US-1. Ironically, the criminal's home was located just minutes of driving away from the American Police Hall of Fame and Museum.

The house itself seemed quite typical. Its siding was painted with creamy yellow paint and its roof was gray. The garden was devoid of flowers but the grass was very green. The lawn was mowed recently and the grass was nice and even.

George took out the key and opened the door. Inside, the detectives saw almost nothing! The only things in the house were an old couch, a wide screen television, a table, and some chairs. Sam turned out to be smarter than the detectives had thought; he kept all the information in his head, leaving no trace of clue anywhere in the entire house!

George bit her lip. "Dead end?"

Nancy had to agree. "Yeah, but we still know that Percival is involved with this. When he comes back from his office, we'll ask him so many questions so fast his head will spin!"

Nancy then felt a strange tingling in her stomach. She then remembered that she didn't eat much when the team was at the restaurant.

"But first, can we get something to eat? I know I already ate, but all this investigating sure made me hungry. Look, it's already three o'clock!"

George shook his head in disbelieve. "Alright, Nancy. We'll go to a McDonald's nearby and grab a burger for you."

The detectives headed toward the nearest McDonald's they could find. There wasn't a parking lot nearby, so they decided that Nancy would go inside and the others would wait outside in the car.

Nancy got out of the car and slammed the door shut. McDonald's was located right across the street, at the left side of the lane. Nancy looked around and made sure no car was nearby. She started walking.

Suddenly, a black car turned around the corner. Nancy stopped and let the car go past, but it didn't. Instead, it headed straight toward Nancy, who was standing in the middle of the road with nowhere to run.

"Nancy!"

George cried out. "Run!"

But Nancy couldn't; her feet were stuck to the ground as if someone had glued them down on the road.

It looked like the car was running at the speed of about sixty miles per hour. The car was gaining speed now, but Nancy was too shocked to move an inch. She was a target for the car, and if she didn't move, the car would surely hit her!

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**_Postscript: _Reminder! Only two more chapters until the end of "challenge" portion. The last three chapters will be the "solution" portion in which I will tell you the killer and the trick he/she used to frame Frank. If you know who the killer is by now, then state it in you review. If not, I will give you more hints in the next two chapters.**

**Keywords: unlawful lawyer, broken vase, a bad day for Frank  
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	11. Arrest

_**Foreword: **_**As I had promised, I will update this story because I got more than five reviews and I am finished with the new chapter. Also, I'm going to answer a question posted by a newcomer here:**

**Nancy Nickerson: It's really easy to load your document! Just go to Documents at the menu and click Documents on the top right corner of the page. Then, at the bottom of the page, you'll see Doc Label, Format, and File on Computer. Pick a name you want to put for the document, select story format, and click Browse. Select your document on your computer, and then click Submit Document. After that, the document will be loaded. To put your story up, go to Stories on the vertical menu at the left side of the screen. Choose New Story at the top right corner. Say that you agree to the content guideline and follow the on-screen instruction after you did so. You'll have your story up in no time! I hope I answered your question. Good luck!**

**Anyway, this chapter is VERY IMPORTANT! It contains details on who the killer is, how he/she got away with murder, and the proof to put him/her right into jail! Be sure to write down every detail. This chapter and the next will mainly focus on the second murder and the suspects, so don't miss out!**

**Also, the story itself will be VERY DIFFICULT to understand without a map of the hotel. I made one using Word. (I made it for those with slow dial-up connections; it's just 30KB!) If you want the map, please say so in your review. I will be more than happy to send you one (it shows me that my readers actually participate in sleuthing with the detectives). Also, you can send an empty e-mail to my e-mail address and I'll return the mail with the attachment. The trick will be very easy to understand once you see the layout of the rooms and the hotel. You'll also see where Nancy and her friends were staying at. This is a must-have if you want to solve the mystery. If you don't want it, it's okay. But when the detectives reveal the trick, you'll need the map to fully understand how it worked. So, just mention if you want a map or not in your review and I'll send you one right away.**

**I know my foreword became the longest one I've ever written. (I hope it's not longer than the chapter itself!) Enjoy my newest chapter and good luck sleuthing! Oh, and review, please!

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_**11**_

_**Arrest**_

Ned opened the door, but Frank was still faster. He jumped out of the car and lounged at Nancy, who was staring with a gaping mouth at the car that was coming her way.

The girl detective shouted in surprise as Frank jumped into her and pushed her out of the way of the speeding car.

Frank was not a moment too soon. Then the car came to the spot where Nancy had been standing just a moment before. The two detectives were just inches away from it.

Nancy gasped as her back hit the ground. Then, the two of them tumbled down a foot or so and stopped. They were covered in dirt but didn't get a scratch.

The driver hit the gas pedal and the car went zooming out of sight. The black car was already gone when Nancy looked up to see his license plate.

"Did you see his license plate?" Frank asked Joe. His brother nodded.

"Sure did. And I'll let the police know about that."

Ned, who had failed to be the one to save Nancy, just sat back. He was feeling strange. He was grateful Nancy wasn't hurt, but he wasn't the one who had saved her from danger; it was Frank. He was grateful and jealous at the same time.

The team of detectives headed for the police station when a police car came behind them and signaled them to stop. Frank stopped the car and got out to talk to the policeman. The officer, who was as old as Nancy's father, said, "Put your hands behind your backs, Mr. Frank Hardy."

The others were astonished to hear this. Why should Frank put his hands behind his back? And how does the officer know Frank's name?

The officer snapped a pair of handcuffs on Frank's wrists. The others in the car gasped. They immediately got out of the car.

"I'm placing you under arrest," the officer said sternly.

"What?" the detectives were surprised. "But why?"

"Just an hour ago, we found that the fingerprint on the weapon had matched yours. I'm afraid that according to the other members in the inn, you were the only one in the room when the sound of shattering glass was heard. All others had alibis. And also, you were in a locked room. One of the two doors was locked and couldn't be locked from outside. But the killer couldn't have gotten out from the other door because that was the one your friends had entered. The kitchen which was right next to the dining room had no way out, so I'm convinced that we have enough evidence to arrest you and put you on trial."

These words shocked the group, but they had known that it was fact; Frank really was the only one in the locked room, and he had been holding the weapon when he had been found.

"This is bad," Nancy muttered. If Frank didn't find the real killer soon, he could be the one facing the life sentence, or worse!

"But officer!" Joe shouted. "Frank just came here yesterday and never even spoke to the man who was killed. The victim never even spoke a word to any of us when we came here. I think Frank has no motive to kill Mr. Cantu."

"No motive, yes. But we have enough evidence that we can use to convince the jury that this young man had killed a guest in the hotel."

"But…"

"I'm afraid you'll have to talk about this later," the officer said. He told Frank to come into the police car with him. Frank didn't argue. He went to the car after the officer. The foursome went back into the car. Joe went to the driver's seat now and they followed the police car to the police station.

Inside the police station, the detectives spoke with the officer. They then told him of the illegal business Samuel Cantu and Percival Stuart were involved in. The officer, whose name was Holloway, frowned.

"I'm afraid there is no evidence proving that any of this had actually happened. After all, everything you are saying is pure speculation. Unless you can prove otherwise, I'm holding your friend here for questioning. He'll have to take the polygraph test and if he passes every single time, then we can be sure he is innocent.

Polygraph test? Nancy was disbelieving her ears. That was another name for a lie detector test, but it didn't actually detect lies but instead saw if the person taking the test showed any sign or symptoms shown by the people who took the test and lied.

"But Officer Holloway, this polygraph test can take hours. And we don't have that much time left!"

"She's right, officer," Joe added. "If we don't hurry, our target might get away! Can't you send your men over to look for Percival Stuart?"

"I'm afraid I can't do that, Mr. Hardy," Holloway said. "This man should stay here for at least three to four more hours for the tests. And we cannot send the men over unless we have the evidence linking him to importing of illegal aliens."

George looked at Nancy with worried look in her eyes. Nancy nodded. "Okay, then, officer. We'll go now, if you don't need us."

The officer let them go, and once outside, Joe stamped his foot down onto the pavement with fury he couldn't hide. "I know that Frank's innocent! And I also know that Percival is the one who killed Sam!"

"But…why?" George asked.

"I have plenty of reasons. He and Sam were doing this shady business to gain money, but then, Sam started demanding more and more money. So he killed him before he could go to the police. Then he made it like Frank killed him so he could have a perfect alibi!"

"That's a good hypothesis, Joe," Nancy said. "But I still have many unanswered questions. What was the footprint made in the garden right outside of Kent's room? What about the trick the killer used to get away from the locked room in less than fifteen seconds? And what about the evidence linking him to the murder and the murder of Christina Stuart? There are still unanswered questions and clues that don't seem to fit the puzzle. Maybe we should stay calm and investigate more on these murder cases."

Joe nodded as Nancy was speaking. She did have a point there. He needed evidence. He needed clues. But most of all, he needed to prove that Frank wasn't the one who killed Sam but was the one who was framed.

"Don't try too hard by yourself, Joe," George said. She grinned at the seventeen-year-old blond. "Ned, Nancy, and I are still here to help."

Joe smiled slightly. "Okay, George. Thanks for your support."

But then, there was a long moment of silence. Nobody seemed to find a word to say to each other.

Nancy thought: _Should I tell Joe to cheer up? But the police caught his brother with the evidence pointing to his killing Sam Cantu. Nobody can be cheerful at a time like this!_

George was thinking: _I hate it when nobody can find the right word to say to each other! I just wish Frank was out of the police station filled with those boneheaded officers who are convinced that obviously-innocent Frank is guilty of a murder!_

Joe had been thinking: _Frank will be released from the police officers once they find that he had passed a million polygraph tests. But proving them would be tough, especially when they say that they have the evidence. But where can I look for clues? Think, Joe, think!_

Ned was the one who broke the awkward silence.

"We can't do anything standing here and be completely locked in our thoughts. We have to do something. We don't even know the killer. How can we know how the killer murdered Sam and framed Frank when we don't even have an idea who the killer is? My suggestion is that we should go back to the inn and talk to the suspects one more time."

Nancy, George, and Joe were all grateful for the sudden inspiration. They nodded.

"But we should tell the police the numbers on the license plate of the car that almost hit Nancy!" George said. The others went inside and told the nearby officer what happened. After a few minutes, the officer promised to let them know when she found out about the owner of the car. The detectives thanked her and went out and toward the car.

The foursome then went into the car and drove back to the bed-and-breakfast. As always, Joe tried to drive as fast as he could, but he needed to stay under eighty miles per hour. He could remember the most recent time when he got his ticket. If his memory was right, that had been the seventh time ever since Joe started driving at the age of sixteen. The first time he got a ticket was the time when he was late to a date with Iola and drove at seventy miles per hour when the speed limit was forty-five.

When the gang arrived at the inn, the innkeeper was outside watering the plants. She grinned as she saw the members come inside. "I certainly wish you can catch the killer soon," she said as the detectives passed her. They said they will try, and she smiled and got back to work.

Joe noticed a black spot on the glove she was wearing. "Is that blood?"

Mrs. Morley looked surprised but suddenly smiled. "Oh, that. I cut myself from pricking my finger with thorns of these roses." She then showed the detectives the roses she had planted the day before yesterday. "What can I get for you young sleuths? Cold cups of lemonade, perhaps?"

"No, thank you, Mrs. Morley," George said, putting down the offer. "We are in a bit of hurry."

After the detectives have gone inside, Mrs. Morley looked at the ground where the footprint had been earlier with a cold stare. She then got back to work.

Nancy, George, Ned, and Joe first went to Kent's room. When they knocked on the door, they heard some shuffling inside and the man appeared. He was wearing his usual clothes, but Nancy noticed that the brown shoes he had been wearing the other day had been changed to a blue one.

"Hi, new shoes?" she asked. Kent looked taken aback for a moment, but smiled.

"Yeah. I just bought it today at the nearby department store. I liked it and bought it because the old one was too small for me."

"I see…" Nancy said. "Well, we need to ask you about your alibi. You said that you were just coming inside when you saw us rush to the kitchen, right?"

"Yes. I heard a commotion when I came back inside from getting dinner. I had no idea a person had been killed."

"I see…" Nancy said again. "Did you have any disagreement with the victim lately?"

"No."

"Well, I think that's all we have to know for now."

Nancy thanked him and closed the door. She then looked to her right. Kent's room was the closest to the door in the dining room that was locked. But because it was locked, he had a perfect alibi. Could he have locked the door from outside using a string of some kind?

No. Nancy was sure of that. The lock was the round type that was on the doorknob itself, making it impossible for anyone to hook a string on the tip of it and pull down, thus locking the lock from outside. Kent couldn't have done that, and Nancy considered that he was unable to commit the crime.

_But wait!_ she thought. _There was a shoeprint on the ground close to the bushes under Kent's window. Could it have been Kent who got out of the room? No, that can't be it. There's no reason he would have to do that._

The detectives decided to talk to Jerome next. He was staying in room three, adjacent to Kent's room. He answered the door when the detectives knocked on it. He seemed awfully upset and tired. "What do you want?" he asked.

"Hi. We want to ask you about your relationship with the victim," George said.

"He and I never met. That's that."

"Okay, so this is your first time meeting him, right?"

"Yeah."

George looked at the notes. "So what about Christina?"

The suspect became quiet for a moment, as if he was thinking what would be right to say at the moment. Then, he opened his mouth. "I guess it's no use concealing this any further. I stole the idea for mystery she had been writing in her notebook. But I was a writer but had no inspiration at that time. I had to come up with a mystery. She was very talented, so I thought she would come up with another one in no time."

"So did you get worried when she told you that if you don't give her one half of the profit, then she would tell the lawyer?"

Jerome's eyes got bigger. "How did you know that?"

"A long story."

"Well, we agreed on giving her one fourth, since I was the one who spent weeks writing the novel, even though she only provided a rough sketch of the plot. She seemed satisfied enough. There's no way I would kill her or Sam. I barely know him at all."

The detectives nodded in agreement that it was time to go ask someone else. But before they closed the door, Nancy noticed the scratch mark on Jerome's wrist. When Nancy asked him of that, he laughed and said, "My cat did this to me. Yesterday, I noticed that my cat had come home dirty. I had to wash her fur, but she hated water. So she scratched my wrist. But it wasn't bleeding that bad, so I decided not to put bandage on."

Nancy nodded. It was a logical story. It didn't seem like Jerome made it up in a second. The detectives said goodbye to him and got out of the room. The foursome was thinking about what they were going to do next.

"But I would like to look at the crime scene first," Nancy suddenly said. "I have a feeling I missed something."

The detectives went to the kitchen. The police have taken the weapon and the broken vase, but Nancy felt that she could still smell the stench of fresh blood. It sickened her, even though she knew the police have wiped the blood off a long time ago. The detectives put on their gloves and looked around.

Nancy suddenly stopped. She saw something dark on the already-dark-magenta-colored carpet. The special linoleum floor had the color of fresh blood, but Nancy immediately knew that the black things were blood. Immediately taking out her magnifying glass, she took a close look.

The other detectives joined. They looked curiously as Nancy scrutinized the marks. They shaped like half moon, and there were two paths of those shapes leading toward the door. Nancy thought for a moment.

"What could it be?" George asked.

Nancy wasn't thinking about the marks. But she had been having a bad feeling about something.

"I get a feeling that the serial murder is not over," Nancy said, and the thought frightened her. "If I'm right, the murderer is still going to kill another person."

"How do you know?" Joe asked quizzically.

"I don't know. It's my gut feeling."

"Or maybe it's your detective's instinct," Ned suggested. "Either way, I think Nancy is right. I hope nothing bad happens…"

And that was when the telephone rang.

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**_Postscript: _Countdown! Only five more chapters until the end! (I decided to have two more chapters before the final showdown) Who is the killer? How did the killer frame Frank? Who will Nancy decide to be her boyfriend? And don't forget the mini-romance involving George and Joe!**

**These and many more questions will be answered in the final chapters. So don't miss them!**

**P.S. Please review!**

**Keywords: passageways, suspect's strange behavior, denial  
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	12. Denial

_**Foreword: **_**Because it's the last week of summer vacation, I will update for the third time this week (since last Friday)! There will be just one more chapter to go until Nancy, George, Frank, Joe, and Ned will reveal the killer. Say in your review whether you want a map of the hotel or not. Don't worry; I won't send you _anything but the map_. Also, I will make a new map describing how the killer got away with murder when Nancy reveals his/her trick.**** Enjoy the new chapter, good luck sleuthing, and _please review_! **

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**_**12**_

_**Denial**_

Her eyes getting bigger, Nancy faced the telephone in the reception desk. What if it was about something bad? Was anyone else dead? Did the murderer take the third life? Or is it about Frank's failing the polygraph?

None of the thoughts were pleasant, and any one of the news would agonize her. George and Joe looked each other for a while, thinking about the same thing: Who was it from? Was it a bad news?

Frustrating seconds passed by before Nancy picked up the receiver. She called to the person at the other end of the line, "Hello?"

"Nancy?"

It was Frank. The thought of his failing the test came into Nancy's mind and it scared her. "Frank! How was it? Did you pass the test?"

"Yeah," the eighteen-year-old detective said. He sounded a little tired. "I took about three of them and passed all, so they decided to release me."

Nancy sighed in relief. "So do you want us to pick you up at the station?"

"Yep. What did you guys do during the three long hours while I was gone?"

Nancy chuckled. "We talked to the guests at the inn. We also found some strange marks on the floor."

"Strange marks?"

"Yeah. They shape like half-moon. It's really dark red. I think it was blood. But I don't know what it's about."

"I see…" Frank paused for a moment.

"And we're still going to ask two more guests: Mr. Morley and Percival. We saw Mrs. Morley out in the garden, but we didn't see Mr. Morley yet. It seems like they both are away."

Frank seemed to note all these down. "Okay, so come pick me up as soon as possible. Did you already tell the police about the car that was about to hit you when we were at Miami?"

"Yeah. The policewoman said that it was going to take a little while, since it was really busy in the police station. But she said she'll call me on my cell phone after I told her the number."

"Great. I'll be waiting."

Nancy put the receiver down and looked at the others. They all seemed to have heard what Nancy had heard and seemed quite relieved. "So Frank called and wants us to pick him up. He passed the polygraph test."

Joe seemed relieved. "Thank goodness he did. So right now he is officially off the hook, right?"

Nancy said she didn't know. "After all, the police have the evidence pointing Frank to his killing Sam. If we don't find out who the killer is soon and give the police the evidence, he will be arrested again. They don't think he's completely innocent."

Ned suddenly thought of something. "Hey, could there be a secret passageway in the kitchen?"

Nancy never thought of that before. She seemed surprised for a moment. "I think that's a possibility. This building was renovated into a bed-and-breakfast just a few years ago, but the building itself was here for centuries. I hear that in old buildings and mansions, there are secret passageways built so the owners could escape during a rampage or when an angry mob came to burn down the house. I think that room deserves a good search."

The detectives decided to get Frank from the police station after they searched the room. Nancy and Ned searched the kitchen while George and Joe searched the dining room.

Nancy first took a look at the refrigerator in the kitchen. She and Ned moved it over a few inches and she peeked into the opening. "No passageway here," she declared, shaking her head.

Ned then searched the cabinets. He took some of the things that were in the cabinets and tapped on the wood inside them. But he found that they were solid and didn't seem to conceal a secret opening. After putting what he took out back inside, the two detectives continued their search.

Meanwhile, in the dining room, the first thing George took a look was at the huge cabinet that contained plates and cups. The two detectives moved the huge cabinet over just a tiny bit. George and Joe were both strong and athletic, so it didn't take them long to make half a foot of opening between the end of the cabinet and the wall. George put her slender arm into the opening and felt the wall. When she took her arm out, she shook her head. "No opening," she said,

After ten minutes of searching, the two teams got together at the lobby and discussed their findings.

"There was no secret passageway after all," Ned said. "I guess my idea was wrong."

"So now we should go get Frank," Joe said. "I'll drive."

The others shared an uneasy look. Finally, George took the car key and said, "Guess what. You've been working too hard, so I'll drive and you can sit back and enjoy the view."

Joe agreed reluctantly.

The detectives arrived at the station fifty minutes after Frank made his phone call. When they got to the station, Frank was waiting anxiously for them. "About time!" he said jokingly. "Now I have an idea of what we can do. First, we should ask Mrs. Morley where her husband is. Then, we can search for Percival in his law office. The latter has a lot of explaining to do for us."

Nancy took out her cell phone. After dialing Mrs. Morley's cell phone number, she heard the lady answer. "Hello?"

"Hi, this is Nancy Drew. Are you done with your gardening?"

"Sure am. What can I do for you, sweetie?"

"I want to know where Mr. Morley is. Could you tell us where he usually is at this hour?"

Mrs. Morley paused for a moment. "Yes. He works in a restaurant downtown as a part-time assistant chef. He usually works from four to nine during weekdays. From nine in the morning to four in the afternoon, he works at the plantation. He works really hard and seriously. He's also a very talented chef. It's almost six, so if you want to stop by at his restaurant for dinner, be sure to look for a restaurant named 'Miamians' Delight'. It received many prestigious awards mostly because of my husband's ingenious cooking skills."

"Great! I think I'll go there for dinner. Um, do you know where Percival works?"

"Percy works in Keene, Dixon, and Stuarts Law Office. The other two lawyers are Carol Keene and Frank Dixon. I think they have been working together for many years. Their office is at the intersection of the 24th Avenue and the 21st Terrace. I think it's about one and a third hours from the inn. Where are you now?"

"At the police station downtown," answered Nancy.

"Then you'll get there in thirty minutes, I suppose."

"Okay, thank you, Mrs. Morley."

After putting her cell phone away into her purse, Nancy told the others what she heard. Frank decided to drive to the office.

When they got to the office, the detectives were fascinated by how tall it was. It seemed like it had twenty to thirty floors.

"Oh, it's not all a single law office," George said, chuckling. "There are restaurants and shops inside. And speaking of restaurant…"

The brunette pointed to the restaurant just across the street. "There is the restaurant Mrs. Morley mentioned!"

Sure enough, the restaurant's name was "Miamians' Delight". The detectives decided to go talk to Mr. Morley before they talked to Percival.

After entering the restaurant, the detectives saw many people in suits and formal outfits eating dinner there. Nancy figured out that it was a dinner spot for those who worked nearby.

In the kitchen, the detectives found the assistant chef sitting down on a chair and drinking a cup of water.

"Huh? Nancy?" Mr. Morley looked at the teenagers. "What are you doing here?"

"We came to ask you about the crimes. Do you have a few minutes to spare?" Joe asked.

"Yes. I'm on a break, so you can ask me whatever you like."

"Okay… Did you know the two victims well?" asked Frank.

"Christina and I were never best friends. But we did talk about cooking once in a while. I don't think she was as sweet as the oranges she grew."

"Why do you say that?"

"Because she was really glacial and unfriendly."

Nancy couldn't believe a man as unfriendly-looking as Mr. Morley talking about a woman who was glacial. If he were telling the truth, then Christina would be the unfriendliest woman in the world!

"So you didn't exactly have a grudge against her?"

"Nope."

"Okay… What about Sam Cantu?"

"I'm not even related to him, so I don't know anything about him more than I know Christina. But he was a man who challenged almost anything. He was quite adventurous and was looking for some way to gain cash quickly."

_Even operate an illegal operation to gain money for himself! _Nancy thought, but she didn't say it out loud.

The assistant chef looked at his watch. "It's time for me to go now. Please stay and eat one of the entrees if you like."

Nancy looked at the watch. And she saw a bandage on Mr. Morley's finger.

"What happened to your finger?"

"Oh, this? I cut myself when I was using the knife."

"Oh…" Nancy nodded. That sounded reasonable enough.

"And now, if you'll excuse me."

After the man was gone, Nancy had a feeling she was mistaken about how cold he seemed when the detectives first arrived. _He's not that bad after all._

The dinner was spectacular; the food served weren't expensive but were very well done. The desserts seemed to melt in their mouths. The five teenagers finished dinner and paid the waiter. After that, they went outside across the street to the law office. By then it was already close to seven o'clock.

The law offices were on the tenth floor. Nancy found that it had a magnificent view of the entire neighborhood, even though most of what she saw was buildings surrounding buildings in the complex jungle of concrete, steel, and glass. The blonde lady at the desk looked at the lot as smiled pleasantly. "May I help you?"

"We'd like to speak with Perci…I mean, Mr. Stuart, please," Nancy said.

"Do you have an appointment?"

"No, but I'm sure he will talk with us. We know each other."

The lady whose nametag said "Eleanor" looked at Percival's schedule and took her glasses out. The glasses had purple frames that matched her outfit perfectly. She looked up and said, "Well, he doesn't have a client to talk to just yet. I suppose he can talk with you for about ten to twenty minutes."

"Great," Nancy returned with a smile. "So where is his office?"

"The third one leads to his office. You should see his name on the door."

"Okay. Thank you."

The detectives then went straight to the office. Inside, they heard someone scribble something on a piece of paper. Frank knocked on the door.

"Yes?" a familiar voice asked from inside. "Who is it? I don't think I have an appointment just yet."

"No, you don't," Frank assured, "but we'd like to talk to you."

"Okay, come on in. The door's open."

When the detectives got inside, they saw Percival sitting at his desk with a pen in his hand and a huge window behind him. From there the detectives could see the river flowing through the heart of Miami. The attorney smiled at the visitors and asked them to sit down on wherever they would like. The detectives found two sofas that could seat two persons each and two sofas that could seat one person each. They were facing each other, making the shape of a hexagon. Percival stood up and went to sit on the sofa that wasn't occupied and asked them, "How can I help you lads?"

"We came here to hear the truth," Nancy said with a hardened expression. "We already know that you were up to an unlawful operation with Sam on bringing illegal aliens into the country."

Suddenly, Percival's soft expression turned hard and cold. It was as if he had been wearing a mask all along. "I don't have a slightest idea of what you are talking about," he said.

"But we already know about it from searching inside Sam's room and…"

"This is nothing but your wild imagination running wilder. I am not in any operation whatsoever! And unless you can find a solid evidence pointing me to this crime, I, as an attorney, will not hear anything more from you and won't answer your questions."

"But…"

"I think it's time to go, detectives," Percival said, standing up. "I am a very busy man. Now, please excuse me…"

Nancy noticed that he was wearing a different tie. Just yesterday, she had seen the man with a blue tie, and now he was putting on a green one.

"Did you change your tie?"

"Of course I did. I spilled coffee on my old one. Please leave now. I'm really busy…"

After the detectives went out, Percival closed the door behind him. "I knew it! They were on to me!" he murmured to himself.

Suddenly, Percival was frustrated. "What if they find out a solid evidence? Then I'll be in trouble! I should've never listened to my stupid cousin. I should've never allowed him in to talking me into committing such crime!"

Percival sat down on the sofa, turning his face away from the door. The sun was setting down, and the room turned as red as fresh blood.

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**_Postscript: Countdown!_ Only one more chapter to go until the revelation.**

**Keywords: Third victim, disappearances of the suspects, chasing the killer**

**Hints: suspect's posession, semicircle marks on the ground, footprint under the window.**

**Next update: August 25th (I think. It might take a little longer.) **


	13. And Then There Were None

_**Foreword: **_**As some of you may have noticed already, the title of the chapter is the same as the title of Agatha Christie's most famous work. You'll find out why I named it the way it is. Anyway, the school year already started, so I finished the story in advance. I will update this story every week, so you would get to think on your own, and I'm starting my next story, so that way I'll have a few more chapters written before I finish this one. This will be the last chapter before I reveal who the killer is. If you have a guess, please say who you think the killer is in your review. I will send, if you want, a preview of the next story if you guess the killer right(unless you don't want a stranger's e-mail sent to you, of course, but I will send nothing more than the preview)! Enjoy, investigate, guess who the killer is, and review, please!

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_**13**_

_**And Then There Were None**_

The five detectives went to the police station to see if the police found out whom the car belonged to. The policewoman wasn't there, but another policeman was there at the desk. When the detectives went to him, he raised his head and said, "Yes?"

"Hello, we came here earlier today and gave the license number of the car that almost hit one of us," Frank said. "The officer said that we would know by now."

The man called someone on the phone at his desk. In less than a minute, another officer appeared from inside the station. He was without a doubt Officer Holloway.

"What can I do for you?" he asked, looking at Frank with a suspicious look. "Was there something you were going to ask me?"

"Yes," George said. "Earlier today, before you arrested Frank, a black car almost ran over Nancy. We got the numbers of the license plate, so we came here to know whom the car belonged to."

"I'm sure you know who has the car, don't you?" Joe asked.

The officer nodded. "Seems like the car belonged to the victim, Sam Cantu. His car was missing when his body was found."

Suddenly, the hopes Nancy had were gone. She had been thinking to find out who was the culprit was by finding out the car he or she drove, but this killer turned out to be a lot smarter than she had expected.

"So, we are back to square one again?" George asked when the detective got stepped out of the police station. "But at least we are doing more to find out the real killer than those officers will in a hundred years; they are so convinced that Frank was the killer they virtually stopped the investigation!"

"And that's what I'm afraid of," Nancy said, knowing that George's statement was true and there was no way to argue with the police. She knew they were reaching for a grape high up on the tree without thinking of a way to get it other than do what was obvious.

"I should've taken a closer look at the driver!" George said in distress.

Joe shook his head. "I looked at the driver, but he was wearing a black ski mask. I couldn't even tell if the driver was a man or a woman."

Nancy was thinking. "I think we should go back to the hotel. It's no use trying to investigate when we don't have a clue who the killer is."

The five detectives went back to the inn. To their surprise, there was nobody at the inn. Not even Mrs. Morley was in the building. The place looked abandoned.

George felt uneasy entering the hotel. "It looks like everyone's suddenly…disappeared…"

Nancy nodded. "An old building like this one sure looks spooky without a person in it."

This reminded Nancy of the old buildings she had visited previously during her detective career. The first one had been the building where the two old ladies lived in _The Hidden Staircase_. It was Nancy's second mystery that ended with the struggle with the neighbor's housekeeper. She received the silver urn from the two ladies in the mansion. The then-sixteen-year-old girl found a hidden staircase leading from the mansion to Nathan Gombet's house.

Now that she thought of it, she hadn't visited Miss Rosemary or Miss Floretta in two years! She had solved the mystery during summer vacation. She was going to be a junior in River Heights High School and had to study, but when Allie Horner came to visit her, she couldn't help but get into yet another mystery.

Thinking about the old cases made Nancy nostalgic. She thought that most of the old mansions had a hidden passage or two, but this one was an exception.

"I guess the former residents didn't want to spend extra money building a hidden passageway or two," she murmured.

But the mansion was very old. The mansion she had investigated in _The Hidden Staircase_ was built during the Civil War, and this one looked like it had been built around that time period. If her memory from American history class was correct, some of the buildings built during the war had passages built right in it so the people who lived there could escape when there was an attack from the Union. The Confederates started forming from 1861 and died off after four years, in 1865. This building seemed old enough to fit in that time period, so there had to be a hidden compartment.

The Sunshine State was getting less and less sunshine as time passed. By the time the hour hand of the clock reached eight, the place was pitch black. But now Nancy could see the full moon and the stars spread across the sky above.

"I'm worried about the guests," George said. "It's strange for them to disappear all at once!"

Nancy agreed. "I'll call Mrs. Morley's cell phone to make sure she's all right."

Taking out her cell phone, the girl detective dialed the woman's cell phone number. "Hello?" she called as she finished dialing.

There was no response.

Nancy looked at her wristwatch with expression of concern spreading across her face. It was almost nine-thirty. Where could she be?

Nancy went to the front desk and looked at the sheets of paper in the drawer. The drawer wasn't locked, so she let herself dig into the files. Nothing seemed important. She then tried the other drawer. This one was locked and she couldn't open it.

"I guess we can't call anybody. I don't know Jerome or Kent's phone numbers, and we just talked with Mr. Morley and Percival. Maybe we should call those two again. But I don't know their numbers, either."

"I know the phone number for both of them," Ned said with a grin. "I thought you'd need it, so I wrote down the phone number of Percival's office. And I'm sure you can find the number for Morley's restaurant by checking the directory over there." He took out a piece of paper and then pointed toward the Yellow Book that lay on the table.

"Splendid idea, Ned!" Nancy said. "Now we'll call them to check."

Nancy first dialed the restaurant Mr. Morley worked in. The chef answered, but it wasn't the man himself. "Hello?"

"Um, hi. I want to speak to Mr. Chris Morley. I'm really interested in what he—"

"Sorry, no can do," the voice said. The man had a deep, rough voice. It seemed like he was one of the singers in choir who sang the lowest notes.

"Why?"

"He just left because he only works till nine. It's nine already."

"Oh, I see."

"He'll be back Monday, so if you want to call him then, you are more than welcome. So, are you making a reservation for the veranda table? Six seats will cost you—"

"Um, no, thanks. I have to go. Bye!"

Nancy flipped her phone shut. She then sighed. "Seems like Kent's the only one we can reach right now…"

The girl detective tried the attorney's office. A woman answered the call, and the girl knew that the person was the woman who was at the main desk when the detectives went to the office to talk to Percival. "Keene, Dixon, and Stuart. How may I help you?"

"Hello. I want to talk to Mr. Stuart."

"Uh… Are you one of the teenagers who came just an hour and a half ago?"

"Yes. In fact, I want to talk to Mr. Stuart again, if you don't mind."

The woman paused for a moment. "I'm sorry, but Mr. Stuart just left right after you left the building."

Nancy was confused. Percival had lied to them about having a client come over! And he told the receptionist to say so! But, if Percival already left an hour and a half ago, then why wasn't he here?

Nancy thanked the woman and snapped the phone shut once again. "It's not good," she said to the others. She then explained the two conversations. All other detectives were baffled by the sudden disappearances of the suspects.

A scary thought came over the titian-haired detective's mind. "Uh-oh. Do you remember the time I said that another murder was going to happen?"

All except Frank nodded.

"Unfortunately, I was right."

The detectives went to their car to go to Miami for any clue they could find. When they came to an intersection, Frank stopped the car because the signal turned red. The van came to a quick halt. All of a sudden, a black car came dashing across the street, going northwest. The detectives suddenly realized that the car was the one that almost ran over Nancy!

"We have to follow them, Frank!" Joe said. "If you don't mind, I'd like to drive."

Frank obviously didn't want his brother to drive, since he, too, knew Joe's superhuman ability to make a car turn into a monster that run fast and destructively.

To Joe's displeasure and everyone's relief, Frank said, "No, I say I'll drive."

The older Hardy stepped on the gas pedal and turned the car left. Some of the cars nearby beeped in complaint, but that didn't seem to bother Frank at all. All he was seeing was the black car that was running in front of them.

The driver of the car saw the approaching vehicle.

"Curses! Those detectives are on to me!"

But when the person looked in the mirror, another figure could be seen tied up on the backseat. The person at the back seemed to be struggling to get free. But the ropes that tied the wrists and ankles were too strong to break free.

"Now, now, don't struggle like that," the driver said with a snicker. "In no time, my revenge will be finished."

The figure that was bound and gagged struggled even more.

"It's not going to help," said the driver. "You'll have lots of time to think about your past and where you've gone wrong once I get rid of you."

Then, with an evil grin, the captor stepped on the gas pedal. The car's speed increased to sixty miles per hour.

"You will regret what you've done. I'll make sure you die as painfully and agonizingly as possible."

The driver then started laughing hysterically. The person at the back feared the driver even more.

"As painfully and agonizingly as possible," the driver repeated.

"Oh, no! That driver is getting away fast!"

George shouted in despair as the car they were chasing gained speed.

"Isn't there a police car nearby?"

"I'm afraid not," Frank said. "Look around."

So the brunette did. She then saw that they were driving on the dark abandoned road. The buildings nearby seemed deserted and there wasn't a soul in sight.

"We are pretty far from the center of the city," Joe said. He took his cell phone out. "And there's no signal. That means we can't call for help now."

Nancy was worried. "I sure hope we can prevent that person from killing yet another one."

"Do you have an idea who the killer is?" George asked.

Nancy shook her head. "I should look over my detective notebook."

The titian-haired girl took out her notebook. "Okay, let me get this straight. Frank was knocked unconscious when he got a letter telling him to go to the dining room. George and I went down to the lobby, then saw Joe coming down the stairs. After a minute or so, we heard a crashing sound in the room. We opened the door and went inside. The door was not locked, and we found Frank knocked unconscious and holding a murder weapon.

"It seems like all the suspects had motive to kill Christina. And Sam was in an unlawful operation bringing in unregistered foreigners into the United States. And Percival was doing the operation with Sam.

"And just after Frank was arrested, we went to the dining room and found strange marks on the floor. It shaped like a semicircle and led to the door."

Nancy closed her eyes and thought about the entire case.

Suddenly, she remembered something about what one of the suspects had on.

Mrs. Morley had a glove with blood on it. Kent bought a new pair of shoes. Jerome had a scratch mark on his wrist. Mr. Morley had bandage on one of his fingers. Percival had a different tie.

Nancy opened her eyes in an instant. "I got it! I know who the killer is, who the next victim will be, the trick used to frame Frank, and the evidence that'll persuade the authority!"

"Really?" George asked, surprised.

Nancy nodded.

"There will be another murder tonight. We'll have to stop the murderer from taking another life!"

* * *

_**Postscript: **_**So, the next two chapters will reveal who the killer is and how he/she framed Frank. Also, there will be a shocking ending, so you won't want to miss it!**

**Preview: abandoned barn, disappearing kidnapper, unveiling the murderer. **


	14. Disclosure 1: Hide and Seek

_**Foreword: **_**Okay, here is the beginning of the revelation! I know most of you didn't even care who the killer was, but I'm glad at least _someone_ made a guess. Anyway, here is the first part of the disclosure, where Nancy is trapped with the killer in an old abandoned barn. Oh, before that, a message for Nancy Nickerson: **

**Well, quitting is always the last solution. You can write a little by little during your freetime and update once a month. Or you can wait until winter and spring vacations to write a lot. Whatever you do, keeping the readers hanging is the worst thing, especially when you are writing a mystery. In my opinion, all other forms of fictions have somewhat predictable endings (Sorry if this offends anybody), but mystery doesn't, since the readers need to know who the criminal was and how/why they killed somebody, etc. If you are feeling like you have a writer's block, then you can rest your fingers for a few days and then find some free times to write more. If you really want to quit, just finish the story you already started and then you can quit. But I think you have many good ideas and would like to read more of the story soon.**

**Okay, in this chapter, the detectives chase after the killer who seemed to have kidnapped another person to be the next victim. Will they stop the killer?**

**

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**_**  
14**_

_**Disclosure #1: Hide and Seek**_

The car kept running without stopping. Frank looked at the time. It was already close to ten o'clock. "Where is that person going to?" he murmured. "At this rate, we'd be going to the stateline!"

Joe groaned. "That's why I never wanted you to drive. If I were you, I'd be driving just inches away from that vehicle!"

"But I never feel safe around you, Joe," Frank said. "Whenever I go with you to chase a criminal, I always get the feeling that my end is near."

"Exaggerating a bit too much, big brother?" Joe asked. "Besides, that time was one of the only times you've ever caught the criminal without his getting away just because you drove too slow."

"I don't care," Frank returned. "We always caught criminals before, and we'll catch one again. Besides, I value my life more than catching those lawbreakers."

Joe snorted. "Fine, bro. Have it your way and let him get away."

"Joe, please!"

It was George. She was looking at the car that was almost disappearing from out of sight. "Can you drive a little faster, Frank?"

Frank grimaced. "I don't know. This car _is _a van, after all."

The concrete road was turning into gravel driveway. The detectives heard the familiar crunching under the wheels. The car rocked side to side at a steady speed, making George a little nauseous. She looked out the window and saw almost nothing but darkness after darkness. The woods nearby were creepy at night, and she definitely didn't want to spend a night there. Silently, she prayed for the car to not run out gas. She just wished they could just go home, but she knew catching the crook was important to at least three people in the group. She just kept quiet and tried not to hurl.

It was actually unusual for an athletic girl like George to feel that queasy, but the long car ride in that condition would have made anyone sick. If she were Bess, then she would have already thrown up in the car a long time ago. The other four members seemed unaffected, but after a while, Nancy let out a sigh.

"I hope the driver knows where he's heading to because I'm getting kind of sick from riding in a bumpy road for nearly twenty minutes! If I'm right, we've been driving for an hour ever since leaving Miami to chase after that black car."

Just as she finished the sentence, she saw the car turned abruptly right. The detectives were unprepared for this, so they couldn't make the turn. Instead, their van went into the grassland.

Grunting, Frank turned the wheel just seconds before the car hit the tree nearby. The car turned left and got on the same road as they had been on for an hour. Then, the detective made a huge U-turn and headed after the black car.

But when they got there, they could see no sign of the car! It disappeared!

"No way!" Ned shouted in disbelief. "We lost him?"

Joe grunted. "The car is black, so I figure he just turned the lights off and drove as fast as he could into the darkness somewhere."

As the detectives looked around, they were in an old and abandoned farm. The word "abandoned" wasn't always Nancy's favorite, and this farm definitely wasn't a great place to stay when the car ran out of gas. Thankfully, it didn't.

The detectives looked at each other. "Okay," Frank said. "We'll need to separate into two groups and search the area. Nancy, George, and I will be in one group, and Joe and Ned will be in another. Since all of us know some way to defend ourselves, we won't leave anyone in the van."

The others nodded. But Ned wasn't happy with the idea of his investigating with Joe and not Nancy, but he didn't complain; this was no time to complain, since they had no time to waste.

"Oh, no, wait!" Joe suddenly shouted. "I need to go back into the car to get my flashlight! Can I borrow the key from you?"

Frank sighed. "All right. Here."

After getting the car key, Joe quickly went to the van and opened the door. In there, he found the flashlight he always carried with him. After locking the door, he put the key into his pocket and went to the barn.

The first group went and investigated the barn; the other group searched around the area.

After they separated, the group with Nancy, George, and Frank went to the door of the barn. It wasn't locked, so they opened it. It opened with a huge creaking sound. Getting in, the detectives turned their flashlights on and shone it around. The barn was filled with dried grass and tools used to carry them. There were also many ropes lying around.

Nancy already knew who the killer was. But she still couldn't believe it. She had solved the mystery and knew what the evidence might be that could get the killer locked up for life. But something in her mind told her that the person wouldn't do such a thing. At least, she didn't think the killer had the motive to kill that victim. Was there to this mystery that she had thought?

The darkness was overwhelming. Even George, who was usually very brave and sometimes foolhardy, felt a chill when she stood in the piles of dried grass. The smell wasn't very pleasant, either. It seemed like the barn was abandoned years ago. It seemed like the owners just vanished, just like the suspects. George shone her flashlights around. She knew where Nancy and Frank were because she could see the lights from the flashlights moving around the area. But there was no way for her to know which one was Nancy and which one was Frank. It was just too dark to distinguish between them, even though their height and clothing differed a lot.

The other two detectives were searching the area around the barn: there were old wagons and a truck nearby. The truck had been there for a long time.

Joe and Ned searched the truck, but they found nothing inside. Then, they found something big right beyond the abandoned car. Surprised, the two went to the spot and shone their flashlights.

To their surprise, there was the black car driven by the person whom Nancy thought was the murderer!

"Is there key in the car?" Joe questioned.

Ned went inside and quickly checked. "No. But the seat is still quite warm. This car had been here for only a short time!"

"But where did the driver and the hostage go?"

The seventeen-year-old blond detective looked around. "There's nobody close by. I think those two disappeared this way!" He then pointed to the footprints that were on the ground. There was also a trace of mark indicating that someone had been dragged after the driver.

When the detectives looked at the footprints, they noticed that they were heading toward a small shed at the back of the barn. They followed the footprints and got right in front of the shed.

"Don't open the shed door yet!" Joe said. "I think the killer is still inside!"

Then, he grabbed a wooden board that was nearby. He thought that he could use it as a weapon just in case the killer attacked them. But he didn't think he needed it: after all, both the detectives were in the football teams and were good at tackling at opponents.

After Joe got hold of the wooden board, Ned opened the door forcefully.

"What?" he muttered.

Nobody was inside. It was just a shed that had tools and machines. Quickly shining their flashlights around for a few moments, they were sure nobody was inside. This puzzled them.

"Okay, so where did the killer go?" Joe muttered.

All of a sudden, the two heard the sound of a dried branch crack. In an instant, they turned around and went outside. Again, there was a cracking noise. It came from behind the shed.

Quietly, the two detectives turned their flashlights off and got outside, Joe was ahead and was the first to go to the back of the shed. Then…

"Ugh!"

Joe let out a moan and stumbled forward. In a second, his whole body went down onto the cold, moist grass underneath their feet. Ned was surprised. "Joe!"

The adversary had a stick as well, but it wasn't like the wooden stick Joe was holding. It was an iron one, and a swing of it on Joe's head knocked him unconscious. From the corner of his eyes, Ned saw the attacker run.

Ned couldn't see the face of the attacker. It was covered with a hat and a handkerchief brought around the face like a mask. There was no way of telling if the person was a man or woman.

"Stop!" Ned shouted. But the person went into the shed. Ned followed and opened the shed. There was no way for that person to get away. But Ned thought wrong.

When the teenager opened the door, the attacker was once again gone.

Back in the barn, George was looking at the side of the barn when she saw a small bag on the ground nearby.

"Hey, Frank! Nancy! Come here!" she called. "I think I found a clue!"

Frank looked up and went to the direction. Nancy was about to do the same when she heard something behind her. "Huh?"

It was like a door opening. But she didn't see a door over here when she searched the area just now. She shone her flashlight at that direction. But suddenly, something cold and hard hit her hand and she lost grip of the flashlight. At that same instant, the door of the barn shut closed!

"What's happening? It's completely dark!" Nancy was surprised at the sudden happenings. She didn't see the attack. The person brought down the iron bar onto her head. Nancy felt the pain.

Frank and George saw the door of the barn shut, and they panicked. Nancy was in the barn with somebody dangerous! The two tried to open the door, but the lock was placed on it, and there was no way to open it from outside. George was hysterical. "Nancy's still in there! She's in there with a killer!"

Nancy didn't black out. After all those incidents where she had been hit on her head, she became used to it. So it took more than a single blow to knock her out this time.

The girl detective looked at her hand. There was no flashlight, but a bruise formed at the place where the attacker hit her hand. "Are you the killer?" Nancy asked into the person in the darkness. She couldn't see a thing.

But then, the moon came out of the clouds and lit the dark place. Lights poured from outside the window and now, Nancy could see the attacker's face. To tell the truth, she wasn't a bit surprised.

"I knew it. I knew it was you," she said calmly.

"Well, well. The famous Nancy Drew figures the killer already! Let's hear how you knew I was the killer and how I escaped from that completely locked room. I must admit, I am quite interested in your explanation." A nasty grin crept over the speaker's face. "That's because this will be your last case."

Nancy grinned. "I knew that you were the killer when I saw the dark red marks on the floor, the fact that you changed your outfit, and from seeing where your room was."

The person laughed. "Oh, really? Please explain to me, Miss Detective."

"First, I found out that the semicircle shapes on the floor were the footprints left behind by the real killer who framed Frank. Because there was a pool of blood on the floor, I figured that you had accidentally stepped on the blood just a little bit and still didn't know because the color of the floor was red as well. When you found out that you had stepped on blood, you panicked. You thought that if the police had found out about this, then it would be obvious evidence against you.

"So you changed your _shoe_, thinking that nobody would notice. Well, unfortunately, I did. I noticed that you changed your shoes after the killing. So I knew you were the killer. But when I saw where your room was in the hotel, I was sure of it. You used an ingenious trick to escape from the locked room so Frank would be framed and you wouldn't be caught. And it was also because the police would stop the investigation, failing to notice the bloody shoeprints on the floor.

"And you were the one who attacked George and locked her to die in the burning shed because she saw the footprint under your window."

Nancy stopped and looked at the person's expression. It was cold and hard.

After a long pause, Nancy said:

"You are the murderer, Kent Stuart."

* * *

_**Postscript: **_**Next chapter will be Disclosure #2, which explains how Kent Stuart escaped from the locked room and who he had kidnapped to kill next.**

**Keywords: the power of love, the wickedness of revenge, gunshot wound  
**

**P.S. You might be surprised by the last keywords. You'll know what it means in the next chapter! (And yes, someone gets shot, but I won't say who.)  
**


	15. Disclosure 2: Twisted Alibi

_**Foreword: **_**I'm not getting as many reviews as I had hoped, and got three reviews less than what I wanted. Oh, well... I guess everyone's busy because of a new school year. Anyway, I'll update as I promised. This chapter ends in a real surprise, and you'll know how Kent killed Sam Cantu with a perfect alibi. Read, enjoy, be surprised at the cliffhanger, and please _review!_ The more reviews I get, the faster I will update.  
_

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_**

_**15**_

_**Disclosure #2: Twisted Alibi**_

Kent Stuart laughed out loud as if Nancy had been telling the funniest joke ever. However, his laughter wasn't that of a person who laughed in delight. It was a menacing laughter of a cold-hearted killer. The laughter was somewhat chilling and made Nancy uneasy.

Then, after the long laughter died out, Kent grinned and said, "That sounds reasonable, but why would there be a footprint under my room's window? And how did I escape from the locked room that had only two exits: one was locked, and the other one had you detectives coming in? There was no other door I could've escaped from."

Now it was Nancy's turn to grin. "You didn't have to get out of the room after the crash was heard, Kent. You just walked out of the room from the open door. It wasn't any locked room: the room was already unlocked, and that door was the one you used to get out."

Kent didn't seem very shocked. He was as calm as ever. "So tell me, Miss Drew… How did I kill Sam without even going inside the room?"

"You didn't, Kent. You killed him just like any killer would: you just took the statue and hit his head. That's all to it."

"But how did I make that noise of a crashing vase?"

Nancy grinned again. "It's really easy once you knew who the killer was. Your room was room number 3, the closest one to the locked door of the dining room. If you see the map of the hotel, it's easy to notice that only you could've done this simple trick. But this simple trick used the psychological trick of human mind. That is, you always think that when you hear something in a closed chamber, you would think that a person must be inside that chamber. So when we saw Frank in the room with the dead body, we thought that he was the only person who could have caused the noise. So the police were convinced that Frank killed Sam and made him knock down the vase.

"But the truth wasn't like that at all. You killed Sam, knocked Frank unconscious in the dining room, and then used that trick to make the vase fall from the shelf without ever being in that room."

* * *

Ned searched the entire shed. "That person couldn't have disappeared like that. That must be a secret passageway!" 

He shone his flashlight everywhere. He couldn't find anything open. But then, he found the huge shelf that had pesticides and bottles of acid.

_Usually, _he thought, _there would be a hidden compartment behind the shelf like this. I should give it a try…_

When the detective grabbed the shelf, he found it quite light. It swung to the left and let Ned enter the dark passage. "I wonder where this thing leads to?"

* * *

Outside, Frank and George were trying their best opening the door, but it remained shut. Frank looked for any ax or something hard and heavy nearby. Suddenly, George had an idea. "Frank! I think we can smash this door open using the van we came in!" 

Frank's face lit up. "That's a great idea! Let's go!"

When the two detectives got to the van, their hope was gone. The doors were locked, and Joe had the key!

"We've got to get Joe!" Frank said. "Come on!"

* * *

Kent snickered. "Oh, so you think you've figured out everything, huh? But that won't answer how I got knocked the vase from the cabinet when I wasn't even in that room. What do you think I am, a psychic?" 

Nancy didn't smile. "You aren't a psychic, but you are a really smart guy. You just used a single string that was about four to five yards long make yourself a perfect alibi."

"Hah! Now I'd like to hear that!"

Nancy thought nervously, _I sure hope Frank and George can do anything about that locked door. Or, if I can open the door… No, Kent will notice that. I have to stall for time!_

She said, "Okay, so first, you had to kill Sam. After that, you had to tie one end of the string to the vase. Then, opening the door leading to your room, you have to slide the other end into your own room. You then lock the door. The next step would be to get out of the room from the door that was still unlocked. When you get into your room, you wait till someone goes into the lobby. At the moment when Joe, George, and I entered the lobby, you would pull the string. The vase will fall to the ground, making an ear-piercing sound. As we entered the dining room, you would get all the string into your room and get out of your room through your window. After going outside, you then came back inside, therefore making yourself a perfect alibi."

Kent's grin totally disappeared.

"You were too smart for your own good, Nancy Drew," the man said. He then took his hand out from behind him. Nancy's eyes got large in an instant. She had thought it was just an iron bar, but it was actually something more dangerous. It was a rifle!

* * *

Frank and George ran to the back of the barn. They found a shed and saw a person lying down on the ground next to it. "Joe!" George shouted, shocked to find the blond teenager sitting there, not moving. "Joe!" 

Frank lifted his brother up. "Is he alive?" George asked, a feared image coming into her mind.

Joe slowly opened his eyes. Frank and George were relieved to see that he was alive. "What happened, bro?" Frank asked.

"A person attacked me when Ned and were searching the shed."

"Where is Ned?"

"I think he went after the attacker. I think he's in the shed…"

"Shed!" Frank looked up at the shed. "Okay, wait here. Hey, can I have the car key?"

"For what?"

"Long story," George said. "We need it right away. Nancy's life may be in danger! She's been locked in the barn with the killer!"

* * *

"I guess you just solved your last case," Kent said, grinning. "And I think you are the best detective till your end, Nancy." He pointed the weapon at the titian-haired sleuth. 

Nancy was worried. Frank and George weren't coming in. She had to keep him talking!

"Why did you kill Christina and Sam?"

"What? I didn't kill Christina," Kent said. A look of fury came over his face. "That crooked Sam Cantu and Percival Stuart killed her!"

Nancy suddenly remembered Percival. "Where is Percival?"

"Right here," Kent said. He shone the flashlight Nancy had dropped at a direction. Behind the hidden door, there was Percival, bound and gagged and helpless. "Christina found out about the operation Sam and Percival were up to and started blackmailing them. Those two were worried that she would tell the police, so they killed her. Just a week ago, they brought her to the cliff and pushed her down the cliff!"

Kent's cold stare turned into a glare burning with fury. Percival winced. "And this unlawful lawyer had been her husband, even though he had killed her! I couldn't forgive that. Christina meant everything to me, and I wasn't going to let those two cold-blooded killers get away with it!"

He turned back to Nancy. He had his rifle aimed at her face. With a crooked grin, he said, "But you found out too much, and I'll have no choice but to kill you so you will keep this a secret."

Nancy was infuriated. "I know that killing is horrible! I know you can't forgive those two for killing someone you love, but you turned into a cold-hearted killer yourself just to avenge Christina. Do you think she would be happy seeing you kill two people related to you? Do you think she would be happy to see you murder members of your own family? Not to mention your brother. You two had been growing together for years, and he had been nice to you. I know he isn't that bad at heart and regrets killing his wife. Killing him won't do you any good!"

"Shut up, you goody-goody girl!" Kent snapped. "Those two killed my beloved one just so they could keep their precious money! I will kill that money-thirsty pig after I finish you off…"

Nancy feared this moment the most. She could stall for time no longer, for the murderer has gotten too infuriated. She had to do something! Something…

Nancy tried to move to her right, but Kent put the rifle up. "Oh, don't try any funny business, girl! I was a very skilled hunter when I lived in Montana when I was a kid. Oh, that reminds me…"

Kent paused for a moment, then continued, "You said that we brothers grew up together, but I didn't grow up with him. I had been taken to my aunt and uncle who lived in Montana because my parents didn't want me, since they already had three kids to take care of. So, to tell the truth, I don't even consider myself a brother of his. Anyway, enough talk now. I don't want you to suffer for too long. It'll be over in an instant…"

The girl detective looked for a way out. Could she use the secret passageway just two feet away?

No, it wouldn't work. When she made a move, Kent would shoot that rifle. And she could trust the fact that he had lived in Montana. This was not going the way she wanted. She knew she should've called the police before coming here!

* * *

George was worried. She and Frank headed toward the van, but it was getting dark again. If they didn't make it soon, the moon would be covered in the clouds and the only light source would be gone! 

She turned on her flashlight.

"Oh, no!" she groaned.

Frank turned around. "What happened?"

"My battery is out already! How about yours?"

Frank and Joe each turned on their flashlights. Frank's lit for a few seconds, then blacked out. Joe's didn't even light up at all.

"This is bad," Joe said, looking up at the sky. "Really bad."

Frank got to the van. "Okay, let's get the key inside and break that door down!"

But that car didn't run.

"Now, what?" Joe asked impatiently. "We don't have time!"

"I know!" Frank returned. "It won't go!"

George looked at the gas meter and groaned. "We're out of gas! No wonder we did, after running in the gravel road for forty minutes."

Frank was thinking. "How can we open the door, then?"

Joe had an idea. "I know! Let's use the killer's car over there," he said, pointing toward the direction where he had found the black car the killer used to get here. Frank and George nodded, then ran after Joe toward the black car. When they got to the car, Frank checked the key.

"It's on! And there's plenty of gas left!"

The detective turned the ignition on and drove as fast as he could toward the barn.

* * *

"I guess it's the end for you now, Nancy Drew…" 

Kent held his rifle at Nancy's head. He pulled the trigger.

"Nancy!"

A familiar voice shouted just a moment before the rifle went off. Nancy closed her eyes, waiting for the pain to hit, then nothingness. But she didn't feel anything. She opened her eyes. She saw the most unbelievable sight.

"Ned!"

The tall detective was right in front of Nancy. Noticing that the killer still had the gun, Nancy immediately kicked the rifle from his grasp. Then, she punched him right in the stomach. After Kent let out a groan, he lay on the ground, unconscious.

"Ned! Are you all right?" Nancy shouted, looking at her boyfriend.

Ned smiled. "Never better…"

Then, he groaned, holding his hand on his stomach. Suddenly, Nancy saw that the white T-shirt he was wearing was turning dark red!

The girl detective shouted in horror, "You…you were hit by the rifle!"

* * *

**_Postscript: _Next chapter will be the last one in this story. I will update this story once I reach 70 reviews (just 3 reviews away!) and/or after a week. My next story will be up two weeks after this story ended. As I said, because it's start of a new schoolyear, I might not update as often as I want. Anyway, I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Because it's the last chapter before the epilogue, I will not give away any hints to what will happen next. You'll just have to wait till next week to find out about Ned!**


	16. Epilogue: Forevermore

_**Foreword: **_**Thank you, SchoolBoredom, for reviewing my older story. It's great to know that my story wasn't forgotten just months after I finished it. But I'm sure it's easier to find my story in the pile of Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew stories compared to Harry Potter or Yu-Gi-Oh (LOL). Anyway, here is the sixteenth and the last chapter in the newest mystery: _Ocean of Deceit_. The title is one of my favorite words in the entire English dictionary: forevermore. That means "at any future time" or "in the future". I like it more than "evermore" because it has the word "forever" in it, and that sounds like a good word to express Nancy and Ned's relationship. So, here is the grand finale. You'll find out what happened to the other suspects and, more importantly, if Ned will survive the shot to his stomach. Read, enjoy, be surprised, and _review_! The next story will be up next week, and it's going to involve murder and mayhem as well. To find out more, read the postscript.  
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* * *

**_**16**_

_**Epilogue: Forevermore**_

Ned held his hand on the wound in his stomach. He groaned as he felt the agonizing pain. Nancy watched helplessly without knowing what to do. "Oh! I know!"

The girl detective put her hand in her pocket. She found nothing. She then looked in her purse. "There!"

Nancy took out a towel. She then used it to cover the wound. "Where are the others?" she muttered, frustrated.

From out of the blues, the black car Kent came on smashed the door of the barn and broke it open. Inside, Nancy could see the silhouettes of three people, and she knew they were Frank, Joe, and George.

"Nancy!" Frank shouted as he ran out of the car. "Are you alright?"

"I am, but Ned was shot by Kent!" Nancy said, worried and shocked at the same time. "We'll have to go to the hospital! He's bleeding pretty badly!"

Frank thought for a moment. "But the nearest hospital is one hour of driving away!"

"We'd have to hurry!" George said.

Joe looked at the car. "So, Frank, want to let me drive this time?"

This time, nobody had any objection.

Joe nodded happily and went into the car. "This car is big enough for all of us, I think," he said, looking at the two people on the floor: one was bound and gagged and the other was unconscious.

The detectives didn't waste a minute. Joe turned the ignition on and the car roared like never before. In no time, they were driving at a speed of seventy miles per hour. Even Frank was impressed at the speed Joe could get the car going.

Ned was holding his stomach the entire time, and as time passed, he slipped into unconsciousness.

* * *

When he woke up, he was in the hospital bed. Nancy and George were looking down at him with expressions of concern. "What…happened?" he asked, feeling his torso. It was still sore, but better than the time he was shot. 

"You should thank Joe," George said with a grin. "He drove the car so fast we got here in forty minutes! And I guess he took about ten years out of the car's life. But I'm really glad you're okay."

"Same here," Nancy commented. "Thanks a lot for saving me, Ned. I would've surely died if you didn't come and save me at that instant. You weren't a hundredth of a second too early."

Ned chuckled. "I guess having been trained as a football player has some advantages, too; you get harder abs that won't even let a bullet go through!"

To this, both girls laughed.

"But seriously, I'm glad I could save you…for once."

Nancy was surprised. "Oh, Ned! Don't tell me you were jealous because Frank saved me twice since the day we got here!"

Ned blushed a little. "Well, you might as well say that. I really…"

Ned didn't complete the sentence. Nancy kissed lightly on his forehead. "Thanks a lot, though. I hope you will continue being my knight in shining armor when I'm in trouble!"

Grinning, Ned returned, "If you get into that kind of trouble all the time, then count me in. I'm always looking for that kind of trouble."

The door opened just as Ned finished the sentence. A doctor in a white suit came inside. He had a pair of glasses, gray beard with slight trace of white in it, and almost no hair except for the temple area, which had dark gray hair with white hair around the ears. He was holding a board with a huge clip on it and was smiling.

"Well, well, well, Mr. Nickerson. It seems like you were really lucky the bullet missed your heart or your lungs. In fact, it missed most of the important intestines by a fraction of an inch! Consider yourself lucky, even after being hit by a crazed murderer with a rifle."

Nancy could hear trace of British accent in the doctor's voice. When she looked at the clock, it was almost ten in the morning.

"You were sleeping for more than an entire day, Ned!" Nancy mentioned. "I was really worried."

At that moment, Frank and Joe entered the room. "So how is he, doc?" Joe asked.

"Much better. It seems like he can be out of this hospital in about two days or so."

Frank sighed in relief. "Okay, doctor. Thanks a lot. May we talk to him now? The nurse over there said that he mustn't be disturbed too much."

"Oh, it's alright. I'm feeling fine now," Ned said. "I want to ask a few questions first, anyway."

When the doctor left and the teenagers were alone in the room, Ned asked, "So, how is Kent and Percival?"

Frank took out a newspaper from underneath his arms and showed Ned the cover.

" 'Man will be put on trial for first-degree murder and attempted murder.' And under that is 'Illegal operation stopped and lawyer held responsible for importing illegal aliens and second-degree murder.' So Percival got second-degree murder?" Ned asked.

Joe nodded. "It seems like the person who actually killed Christina was Sam, and Percival was just there to lure her to the cliff. So I guess the two mysteries are finally solved."

Nancy remembered something and said, "Oh, yeah, about that… I called Mr. Chandler this morning. He seemed really concerned about your injury, since he was feeling responsible because he was the one who sent us to Florida. But he was relieved when he heard that you were okay. He said he's going to make us special complementary dinner when we go back to River Heights."

"That sounds mouthwatering," Joe said. "When we get back to Bayport, we'd sure love to visit you and eat that complementary dinner. After all, that restaurant is famous throughout the Northeast!"

"I'll bet that with you, the entire dinner will disappear like Houdini!" Frank said jokingly.

"That reminds me… What happened to the suspects when we went to the hotel to talk to them? It seemed like they, too, pulled a Houdini," said Ned questioningly.

Nancy grinned. "It was just all coincidence. Mrs. Morley was out to buy groceries at a local supermarket, but her cell phone ran out of battery. And Jerome said that he went to the publisher and talk about the book concerning the mystery he wrote using notes in Christina's notebook. He told the publisher to stop publishing the book because it wasn't exactly his idea. He told us that he felt sorry for Christina because she had been killed, and he is pretty superstitious, too."

"He thought Christina's ghost would come back and haunt him. Talk about weird!" mentioned George. "I guess that's why he became a famous writer: he has creativity, that's for sure."

"By the way," Nancy said, "Mrs. Morley really felt sorry for her brother. She said she would invite us to a dinner banquet back in Orange Farm Inn when you come back from the hospital."

"Wow, dinner after dinner!" George said, acting as if she was getting sick of it. The others laughed.

After a pause, Nancy asked Ned, "Tell me, was the story you told about your junior year in high school true?"

Ned smiled. "Yeah. I didn't want another girl I loved to leave."

At this point, George knew immediately that the two of them wanted to be left along, so she pushed Frank and Joe out of the room. Frank understood the message and grinned, but Joe seemed a little confused. The two didn't notice that and kept talking.

"I'm really glad I met you, Nancy. You attract mysteries as much as you attract men!" said Ned, smiling.

Nancy smiled. Her face was blushing slightly. "I'll try not to get into too much trouble, Ned. Maybe this detective thing isn't right for me…"

Ned grabbed Nancy's hand. "No, Nance. I _want_ you to do as much detective work as you want. As a boyfriend, I'll support you no matter what."

Nancy added with a grin, "And I'll love you always, Ned."

* * *

**_Postscript: _I'm sure Nancy Nickerson will be the person who is most satisfied with the last sentence. Next mystery will involve the Hardys, Nancy, and Bess. Murder will occur in the story and the detectives will try to solve yet another crime that seems to be impossible! The previous trick involved a map, so some people didn't understand it very well. But the next one will involve a timeline, so it'll be easier to comprehend and solve. The place will be in Seattle, while the group goes to listen to a symphoney performance with one of Nancy's friends in it.**

**If you didn't know, I picked that place because it's the seventy-fifth anniversary of Nancy Drew mystery stories and because Her Interactive, the game company that produces Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys computer games, is located there.**

**The criminals will get cleverer and more cunning, and will the detectives find the killer and bring the cold-blooded murderer to justice? You'll need to find out by reading the next novel, titled: _Out of Tune_.**


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